The PhD candidate, Adrià Rivera, whose doctorate was funded by a Spanish Ministry of Universities grant and supervised by Observatori researcher Dr. Elisabeth Johansson-Nogués (IBEI), successfully defended his thesis on Friday February 24th at the Universidad Autònoma de Barcelona campus. Dr. Rivera was awarded a grade ‘A’ from the panel, composed of the panel chair and Observatori senior researcher Dr. Esther Barbé (UAB/IBEI) along with Dr. Anna Khakee (University of Malta) and Dr. Federica Zardo (Danube University Krems).