Biodiversity of ecosystems in an arid setting: The late Albian plant communities and associated biota from eastern Iberia.

Deserts are stressful environments where the living beings must acquire different strategies to survive due to the water stress conditions. From the late Albian to the early Cenomanian, the northern and eastern parts of Iberia were the location of the desert system represented by deposits assigned to the Utrillas Group, which bear abundant amber with numerous bioinclusions, including diverse arthropods and vertebrate remains. In the Maestrazgo Basin (E Spain), the late Albian to early Cenomanian sedimentary succession represents the most distal part of the desert system (fore-erg) that was characterised by an alternation of aeolian and shallow marine sedimentary environments in the proximity of the Western Tethys palaeo-coast, with rare to frequent dinoflagellate cysts.

Mapping Early Pleistocene environments and the availability of plant food as a potential driver of early Homo presence in the Guadix-Baza Basin (Spain).

The Guadix-Baza Basin, in SE Spain, harbors hominin fossils and lithic artifacts dated to ca. 1.4-1.