The Biodiversity and Cnidarians Evolution Group of the Cavanilles Institute of Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology (ICBiBE) of the University of Valencia, was formed after the incorporation of Dr. Álvaro Luis Peña Cantero to the ICBiBE in 2004. So far, Dr. Peña Cantero had developed his research activity at the Department of Zoology of the University and as a postdoctoral researcher at the National Museum of Natural History in Leiden (Holland).

The Biodiversity and Cnidarians Evolution Group have close scientific collaboration with Dr.Vervoort (National Museum of Natural History in Leiden, Netherlands) and Dr. Marques (University of São Paulo, Brazil).

Furthermore, the the Biodiversity and Cnidarians Evolution Group is part of BENTART group, which includes nearly 40 researchers from different Spanish universities and research centres, and develops various research projects on Antarctic benthos.