About
22
Publications
5,549
Reads
How we measure 'reads'
A 'read' is counted each time someone views a publication summary (such as the title, abstract, and list of authors), clicks on a figure, or views or downloads the full-text. Learn more
250
Citations
Citations since 2017
Introduction
I seek to understand how the environment interacts with evolving phenotypes to determine where species can live, and on the consequences of such interaction over different organizational levels of nature (i.e. Individuals' phenotypes, population abundance, species' range size, community richness, etc). Lately, I am mostly focused in using that understanding for developing a new approach for forecasting species' vulnerability to climate change. Even thought most of my work focuses on lizards, I enjoy working with other organisms too. I use an array of approaches including field studies, laboratory experiments, museum data collection, geographic modelling and videogames.
Publications
Publications (22)
Global studies of organismal distribution and climatic vulnerability rely on the mostly untested assumption that heat tolerance restricts the maximum temperatures estimated at the warm edges of their geographic distribution (Tmax). Herein we test this assumption across the animal kingdom and examine whether the strength of restrictions depends on h...
Critical thermal limits (CTmax and CTmin) decrease with elevation, with greater change in CTmin, and the risk to suffer heat and cold stress increasing at the gradient ends. A central prediction is that populations will adapt to the prevailing climatic conditions. Yet, reliable support for such expectation is scant because of the complexity of inte...
We quantified functional traits (escape strategy, sprint speed and predatory performance) and population density across 10 lizard species representing morphotype stages in the acquisition of burrowing snake-like morphotypes (BSLM), from Brazil. We used phylogenetic mixed models to test if: (a) morphotype and substrate affects flight strategy and sp...
Within the Neotropical genus Anastrepha, the nominal species Anastrepha fraterculus is widely distributed from Mexico through northern Argentina. Currently it is believed to comprises a complex of at least eight cryptic species—known as the Anastrepha fraterculus complex (AF complex)—three of which occur in Brazil: A. sp.1 aff. fraterculus, A. sp.2...
Evolutionary ecologists seek to understand how phenotypic evolution relates to population level traits. To document that, we quantified functional traits (escape strategy, sprint speed and predatory performance) and population density across 10 lizard species representing the acquisition of burrowing snake-like morphs (BSLM), from Brazil. We used p...
Thermal variation has complex effects on organisms and they respond to these effects through combined behavioral and physiological mechanisms. However, it is less clear how these traits combine in response to changes in body condition (e.g., size, hydration) and environmental factors that surround the heating process (e.g., relative humidity, start...
To understand species′ climatic vulnerability, our measures of species’ thermal tolerance should predict their geographic thermal limits. Yet, this assumption is ungranted. We tested if animals′ heat tolerance restrict the warmest temperatures they can live at (Tmax), distinguishing among species differently challenged by their thermal environment....
En este trabajo se actualizó la distribución de las especies de reptiles en la provincia de
Córdoba. Se usaron datos del Servidor de Información de Anfbios y Reptiles de España
(S.I.A.R.E.), el portal GBIF y observaciones propias. Para cada especie se comprobó su
presencia o ausencia en cuadrículas UTM de 10x10 km. Se encontraron registros de 21
es...
Critical thermal limits (CTmax and CTmin) are predicted to decrease with elevation, with greater change in CTmin, and the risk to suffer heat and cold stress increasing at the gradient ends. A central prediction is that populations will adapt to the prevailing climatic conditions. Yet, reliable support for such expectation is scant because of the c...
Predicting the effects of high environmental temperatures and drought on populations requires understanding how these conditions will influence the thermoregulatory behavior and thermal tolerance of organisms. Ecto-therms show proportional (fine-tuned) and all-or-none (abrupt) responses to avoid overheating. Scattered evidence suggests that dehydra...
The Pantepui region of northern South America harbours an endemic fauna that differs dramatically from those of the surrounding lowland rainforests and savannas. A component of this unique fauna is Riolama, a poorly known genus of microteiid lizards with four described and two undescribed species restricted to tepui mountains. We here implement an...
Thermal variation has complex effects on organisms and they deal with it by combining behavioral and physiological thermal tolerance. However, we still do not understand well how these two types of traits relate to body condition (e.g. size, hydration) and environmental variables (e.g. relative humidity), some of which are typical aspects of therma...
Ecological diversification often encompasses exposure to new thermal regimes given by the use of specific spatial (microhabitat) and temporal (activity periods) niches. Empirical evidence provides links between temperature and physiology (e.g. rates of oxygen consumption), fostering predictions of evolutionary changes in metabolic rates coupled wit...
Understanding the impacts of anthropogenic climate change requires knowing how animals avoid heat stress, and the consequences of failing to do so. Animals primarily use behavior to avoid overheating, but biologists' means for measuring and interpreting behavioral signs of stress require more development. Herein, we develop the measurement of behav...
The current proposal about the variation of standard metabolic rates (SMR) in snakes predicts that SMR is influenced by the feeding frequency (frequent or infrequent feeders). However, feeding frequency in snakes is poorly studied and hard to quantify under natural conditions. Alternatively, foraging strategy was studied for a large number of speci...
Zoologists rely on mechanistic niche models of behavioral thermoregulation to understand how animals respond to climate change. These models predict that species will need to disperse to higher altitudes to persist in a warmer world. However, thermal stress and thus thermoregulatory behavior may depend on atmospheric oxygen as well as environmental...
The lizard genus Psilophthalmus was originally described from the sandy deposits at the northern end of Serra do Espinhaço, in Santo Inácio, state of Bahia, but since then it has been recorded in other Brazilian localities of the states of Bahia, Minas Gerais, and Sergipe. Here, we review the collected specimens based on molecular markers (mitochon...
Understanding methodological and biological sources of bias during the measurement of thermal parameters is essential for the advancement of thermal biology. For more than a century, studies on lizards have deepened our understanding of thermal ecophysiology, employing multiple methods to measure thermal preferences and tolerances. We reviewed 129...
A porção norte do domínio do Cerrado é uma das áreas historicamente menos conhecidas com relação à sua biodiversidade. Recentemente, alguns estudos tem revelado valores de riqueza comparáveis a outras regiões dentro do domínio. A Estação Ecológica Serra Geral do Tocantins (EESGT) está localizada na região do Jalapão, porção Nordeste do Cerrado, e f...
