Portal de Turismo de Castilla y León

Dates

November 17, 2026

When?

Soon

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Every day we unlock our phones with our faces, pay with our fingerprints, or cross borders thanks to biometrics. But what exactly is biometric data, and why is it so special? In this talk, Paula Delgado de Santos, a researcher from Segovia, will explain what biometrics is, the different types that exist (physical, like facial or iris scans, and behavioral, like gait or typing patterns), and how artificial intelligence learns to recognize us. Drawing on her own experience, from afternoons spent studying in this library to her international doctorate, she will explain how it's possible to identify a person simply by how they use their phone, and why privacy is just as important as recognition. We'll also discuss the risks: biases, deepfakes, identity theft, and mass surveillance, what European regulations say, and how to protect ourselves. This informative talk is open to everyone, with time for questions.

Paula Delgado de Santos (Segovia) holds a PhD from the University of Kent (UK) and the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM), in a joint doctoral program funded by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant from the European Union. She previously completed her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Telecommunications Engineering at the UAM, with an Erasmus exchange in Switzerland where she conducted her Master's thesis research on signature biometrics. Her dissertation, "Mobile Device Background Sensors: Authentication vs. Privacy," was a pioneering work in applying transformers to behavioral biometrics to recognize individuals by their gait or mobile phone typing patterns, while simultaneously protecting their sensitive data. For this work, she received the 2026 Spanish Scientific Society for Informatics (SCIE) – BBVA Foundation Research Award in the Young Researchers in Informatics category. She is currently an Artificial Intelligence researcher in Telefónica's Scientific Research team, where she works on biometrics, privacy, and federated learning. In addition, she is a university professor of Artificial Intelligence (currently at IE University and previously at the Autonomous University of Madrid) and participates in scientific outreach activities and the promotion of STEM vocations.

Decapod crustaceans—crabs, lobsters, shrimp, and other groups—have been part of marine ecosystems for millions of years. Throughout their history, they have undergone significant evolutionary changes and several major phases of diversification, resulting in the enormous variety of forms we know today.
In this talk, we will briefly explore the origin and evolution of crustaceans, using the fossil record to understand what these animals were like in the past and how they came to inhabit different marine environments. The central part of the talk will be dedicated to the Eocene, a particularly interesting period for the evolution of crustaceans and, moreover, directly related to the rocks found in the slabs of the Segovia Library. The fossil crabs preserved in these rocks will serve as our starting point to discover how these animals lived some 40 million years ago and what they can tell us about the ancient seas that covered this region.

Fernando A. Ferratges is an invertebrate paleontologist at the Geological and Mining Institute of Spain of the Higher Council for Scientific Research (IGME-CSIC), where he develops his research focused mainly on the paleobiology and evolution of decapod crustaceans.
She graduated in Geology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona and completed a Master's degree and her PhD at the University of Zaragoza. Her doctoral thesis, dedicated to the decapod crustaceans of the Eocene in the central southern Pyrenees, received the highest possible grade, Summa Cum Laude.
Her scientific career includes more than thirty articles in international journals, as well as the description of numerous new genera and species of fossil crustaceans. Her research combines paleontology, stratigraphy, and sedimentology to study how environmental changes have influenced the evolution and diversification of marine organisms.