My career as researcher has been devoted to the study of the organization of benthic marine communities, especially in the NW Mediterranean. These highly diverse communities allow to address a great number of relevant scientific questions dealing with the structure, the functioning and the main processes driving these communities. Mediterranean sublittoral rocky benthic communities are particularly sensitive to climate change, pollution and the spread of invasive species, among other disturbances. Currently, there is an increasing concern about the unexpected consequences on direct and potential combined effects of these disturbances on coastal communities. The study of these human impacts and their interactions has been pivotal in my career. I have focused in four different lines of research:1) Invasive species: Determine the effects of invasive species on native communities, and disentangle the factors that may determine the invasibility of native communities and the spread of alien species;2) Water pollution: Identify the effects and the first signals of pollution as key indicators for the conservation of Mediterranean assemblages and as an unavoidable step for the implementation of recovery measures;3) Global warming: Research on the direct and indirect effects of the actual warming trend as a first step towards developing predictive tools and for a better understanding of further consequences on ecosystems functioning.www.emmacebrian.infowww.medrecover.org