Rita González-Villanueva

• PhD
• PhD at Spanish National Research Council

Coastal zones are strategic environments of high socioeconomic, political, and ecological value, with over half of the world's population residing within 200 km of the coast. This proximity highlights their vulnerability to extreme events, which are exacerbated by global changes, leading to significant coastal impacts such as erosion, flooding, and...

La playa de Las Canteras (Gran Canaria) es el principal reclamo turístico y de esparcimiento de la ciudad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, por lo que tiene gran importancia socio-económica. Por ello, el balance sedimentario de la playa ha sido objeto de estudio constante en las últimas décadas, documentándose una tendencia a la acumulación de sedimen...

There is a relative lack of research, targeted models and tools to manage beaches in estuaries and bays (BEBs). Many estuaries and bays have been highly modified and urbanised, for example port developments and coastal revetments. This paper outlines the complications and opportunities for conserving and managing BEBs in modified estuaries. To do t...

Citizen science-based monitoring projects have emerged as powerful tools for understanding morphodynamic changes in beaches and fostering the democratization of coastal research and management. The CoastSnap initiative exemplifies this approach. This study provides a comprehensive overview of the background and evolution of the CoastSnap initiative...

Sandy beaches are ever-changing environments, as they experience constant reshaping due to the external forces of tides, waves, and winds. The shoreline position, which marks the boundary between water and sand, holds great significance in the fields of coastal geomorphology, coastal engineering, and coastal management. It is crucial to understand...

Sandy beaches are ever-changing environments, as they experience constant reshaping due to the external forces of tides, waves, and winds. The shoreline position, which marks the boundary between water and sand, holds great significance in the fields of coastal geomorphology, coastal engineering, and coastal management. It is crucial to understand...

El desarrollo y evolución de los sistemas arenosos costeros está gobernado por un frágil equilibrio dinámico entre la interacción de múltiples factores ambientales, y por ello estos sistemas naturales son altamente sensibles a las perturbaciones humanas. Estas alteraciones se acentúan en el contexto actual de Cambio Global. Los cambios en los vient...

Open-access dataset: Time-series of shorelines from Spanish Sandy beaches from citizen-science monitoring program. The shoreline dataset is provided in 1 GEOJSON file: SCShores.geojson. This dataset covers five sandy beaches located on the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of Spain where CoastSnap stations were available, and it includes more than...

Benthic foraminifera are important components of the ocean benthos and play a major role in ocean biogeochemistry and ecosystem functioning. Generating ecological baselines for ocean monitoring or biogeographical distributions requires a reference dataset of recent census data. Moreover, the information from their modern biogeography can be used to...

Coastal dunes evolve in direct response to primary drivers, such as wind and waves, which can significantly influence the landscape. Here, we examine the effects of the wind and wave regimes on the vegetation cover and shoreline position of the dune system that makes up the Doniños barrier on the rocky NW Iberian coast since the middle of the 20th...

Foraminifera are important components of the ocean benthos and play a major role in ocean biogeochemistry and ecosystems functioning. Generating ecological baselines for ocean monitoring or biogeographical distributions requires a reference dataset of recent census data. Besides, the information from their modern biogeography can be used to interpr...

The detection of the shoreline and its trends is essential for accurate beach monitoring. Among the new tools for shoreline extraction, CoastSat (open science based on satellites) and CoastSnap (citizen science based on smartphone images) suppose a revolution in terms of cost, coverage, and spatial and temporal resolutions, with the integration of...

This editorial introduces the Special Issue entitled “Geomatic Applications to Coastal Research: Challenges and New Developments” and succinctly evaluates future trends of the use of geomatics in the field of coastal research. This Special Issue was created to emphasize the importance of using different methodologies to study the very complex and d...

A large percentage of the world’s population lives along the coastal zones, with more than half of the world’s population living in coastal areas. In such a manner, human beings depend on the coasts and oceans for their survival. In more than one way, the coastal areas remain an untapped and untamed resource; however, they are not uninfluenced byhu...

In the context of global climate change and sea-level rise, coastal dunes are often important elements in the coastal response to storm wave and storm surge impacts on coastal lowlands. Vegetation cover, in turn, has profound impacts on coastal dune morphology and storm-buffering function; it binds existing sediment, promotes fresh sediment accumul...

Predictive habitat mapping has shown great promise to improve the understanding of the spatial distribution and complexity of benthic habitats and is a valuable means to highlight species-environment relationships where field data are limited. Although spatial distribution models may represent an important step forward in science-based ecosystem ma...

Barrier breaching and subsequent inlet formation represent critical processes that ensure the temporary or permanent connection and transference of water, nutrients, or living organisms between a lagoon and the open sea. Here, we investigate the conditions inducing natural barrier breaching through a 34 months monitoring program of water-level osci...

Tsunamis are highly energetic events that may destructively impact the coast. Resolving the degree of coastal resilience to tsunamis is extremely difficult and sometimes impossible. In part, our understanding is constrained by the limited number of contemporaneous examples and by the high dynamism of coastal systems. In fact, long-term changes of c...

The AD 1755 tsunami was the most devastating tsunami that affected Atlantic Europe in historical times. In this work we summarize its sedimentological signatures in lowlands (Martinhal, Barranco, Furnas, Boca do Rio, Salgados-Alcantarilha) of the Algarve coast that contrast in geologic and geomorphological settings and sediment abundance. We found...

The rocky and indented coast of NW Iberia is characterized by the presence of highly valuable and vulnerable, small and shallow barrier–lagoon systems structurally controlled. The case study was selected to analyse barrier–lagoon evolution based on detailed sedimentary architecture, chronology, geochemical and biological proxies. The main objective...

This manuscript presents a compilation of didactic experiences, which address the teaching of Earth Sciences through the knowledge of geological heritage. The aim of these proposals is to promote students’ comprehension of the Earth processes so that they may develop a positive attitude towards them. The six activities chosen offer a catalogue with...

A blowout is a depression or hollow formed by wind erosion on a preexisting sand deposit, formed together with an adjoining sand accumulation (depositional lobe, blowout dune, or garmada) for which sand is derived from the depression or other sources (Glenn 1979; Hesp 2002).

Geological guide of the Atlantic Islands of Galicia National Park (Spain), in which the materials as well as the geological and geomorphological processes in the territory of the archipelagos covered by the National Park are described. The most representative geological itineraries of each island are also included. See preview in: https://www.igme....

The study of transitional environments, like barrier-lagoon systems, requires a multi approach analysis from different time scales to get a complete picture. In this thesis different time scales and different methodologies have been adopted and leaded to the conclusion that the evolution of the barrier-lagoon systems along the Atlantic Galician coa...

Cold-water corals (CWC) are azooxanthellate species which develop in a complex environment ruled out by a delicate interplay between geological, biological and oceanographic conditions.High impact deep-sea bottom trawling activities are seriously compromising the health and state of conservation of CWC habitats. It has been recently discovered that...

Dunes in temperate latitudes have experienced a significant stabilization in recent times, essentially as a consequence of the expansion of dense vegetation cover. Yet, the causes for this gradual stabilization as well as the causes promoting antecedent aeolian mobilization remain poorly understood. The Traba coastal dune field, located in NW Spain...

Understanding water dynamics and the processes affecting water elevation in the lagoon is important in understanding how barrier-lagoon systems work and, in particular, how it affects sediment distribution and architecture. It is also important in resolving a number of environmental problems related to flooding and land management. Louro barrier-la...

Several surveys have investigated the deposits located in the Galician rias, and those studies demonstrate an increase in the sedimentation rates upwards, which is attributed to the anthropic influence. This paper tries to correlate these results with demographic and social processes produced in Galicia in the last two centuries. Sedimentation rate...

The aim of this work is to present the results of GPR surveys from a large trough blowout and a saucer blowout associated to an energetic shoreline in a temperate-humid coastline (NW of Spain Traba sedimentary complex), cross-validated with core data and field exposures. Finally, to relate the sedimentological information obtained from the interpre...

Coastal sand barriers are of high environmental significance because they provide protection for highly productive landward environments. However, they are also highly susceptible environments as they can be affected by different factors such as sea-level changes, waves, tides, currents, sediment supply, seafloor slope and morphology, coastline dev...

Louro sedimentary complex is an example of a barrier lagoon system developed during the Holocene transgression in the Atlantic coast of Spain in an exposed area, located on a small bay in the external divide between Muros and Noia Rías (Galicia). The present study analyzes the architecture and evolution of the sedimentary complex in the last 6000 y...

The aim of this paper is the study of the sedimentary architecture and evolution of Louro sedimentary complex, located in the Atlantic Galician margin. The sedimentary complex is located in the external area of Muros and Noia Ría, (northwest Galicia) and is highly affected by the high-energy local maritime climate and storm events. Sediment archite...

GONZÁLEZ-VILLANUEVA, R., COSTAS, S. ALEJO, I. and PÉREZ-ARLUCEA, M., 2007. Morphological changes forced by the tidal cycle in a low estuarine beach. The aim of this study is to analyse the morphological variations of a low energy estuarine beach during a tidal cycle. Following this purpose, two surveys were deployed under contrasted hydrodynamic co...

Ladeira Beach is a north-south, 1.3 km long and 88-120 m wide dune-beach complex, which protects a 0.88 km 2 intertidal area, which at high tide forms a lagoon. The beach is a low-tide terrace reflective beach. Three rivers enter the complex, merging and connecting the open sea by a narrow inlet at the north. An ebb tidal delta is developed at the...