Andreas Y Troumbis

• PhD
• Professor (Full) at University of the Aegean

Decreases in animal mortality due to wildlife-vehicle collisions have been consistently documented as an environmental effect of human mobility restrictions aimed at containing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we investigate this phenomenon on the mid-sized Mediterranean island of Lesvos, considering a multi-species group of mamm...

Vegetarianism, as a dietary pattern, is characterized by animal product avoidance and increased consumption of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes. It has been associated with health benefits, both physical and psychological, and has raised interest as a potential strategy for cancer prevention and treatment, which remains one of the lead...

Understanding fine-scale spatial ecology is essential for defining effective conservation priorities, particularly at the range margins of vulnerable species. Here, we investigate the spatial ecology and habitat associations of the Persian squirrel (Sciurus anomalus) on Lesvos Island, Greece, representing the species’ westernmost distribution. Usin...

The Anthropocene is a concept that highlights the profound changes humans have made to nearly every aspect of the Earth. It serves as a compelling narrative that challenges us to examine public perceptions and interests regarding human–nature interactions in an integrated way. These interactions are widespread but can vary significantly over time,...

The Anthropocene is a concept that highlights the profound changes humans have made to nearly every aspect of the Earth. It serves as a compelling narrative that challenges us to examine public perceptions and interests regarding human-nature interactions in an integrated way. These interactions are widespread but can vary significantly over time,...

This research aims to provide guidelines using probabilistic methods to understand better the dominant characteristics of the 824 under-pressure wetlands on 75 islands within Greece and to inform future conservation efforts. Identifying the characteristics and types of anthropogenic pressures is crucial for developing effective conservation strateg...

The COVID-19 pandemic has not just gently nudged but forcefully thrust environmental issues into the forefront of public consciousness. This shift in awareness has been a long-time aspiration of conservation scientists, who have played a crucial role in advocating for recognizing nature’s contributions to human life and a healthy environment. I exp...

The COVID-19 pandemic has not just gently nudged but forcefully thrust environmental issues into the forefront of public consciousness. This shift in awareness has been a long-time aspiration of conservation scientists, who have played a crucial role in advocating for recognizing nature’s contributions to human life and a healthy environment. We ex...

For more than two decades in Lemnos island an overpopulation of the European Wild Rabbit (WR) ( Oryctolagus cuniculus ) is recorded despite its sustainable presence from ancient times. This disruption of ecological balance is causing significant economic loss in farmers and social conflicts among local stakeholders. Various actions to reduce WR pop...

This study explores the historical occurrence of wetland ecosystems in Greece by using recurring Phragmites australis (common reed) burnings as an indicator. Phragmites australis, a plant closely associated with wetlands, provides excellent insights into wetland distribution. We establish a substantial association between reed fires and historical...

This chapter introduces the concept of Environmental Syndemics as a conceptual reference tool to examine the effects of co-occurring, synergistic factors or stressors upon the status of biodiversity in Greece. After the multiple, sequential and/or overlapping crises of the last decades, Greece presents ambivalent trends in the state of the environm...

Resin, a forest product with diverse applications, has been utilized for numerous years. Despite its historical utilization in resin collection, the impact of resin tapping on the growth of East Mediterranean Pine (Pinus brutia) remains elusive. Thus, the primary objective of this study is to investigate the effects of resin tapping on the growth o...

There have been numerous attempts to establish a correlation between obesity and stress, inflammatory, and dysmetabolism biomarkers in children and adolescents. Here, we performed a meta-analysis of existing studies to shed light on the elusive correlations of childhood and adolescent obesity with physiological indicators of stress, inflammation, a...

Background Medicinal plants and herbs constitute rich sources of flavoring, and aromatic compounds, namely phytochemicals, which have many positive impacts on human health, such as antioxidant, anticancer, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, cardioprotective, and neuroprotective properties. Such bioactive compounds may be considered lead compounds th...

Featured Application The universal applicability of thermal and phenotypic indices enables the assessment of tree health across diverse ecosystems. Abstract Successful conservation through monitoring of ecosystems and species, which entails the quantification of disturbances at the ecosystem, species, and population levels, presents significant ch...

The term ‘sustainable diets’ (SDs) was first introduced in the scientific literature in 1986 and later defined in detail by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) as pertaining to those diets that can promote environmental health ad effectively ensure food and nutrition security as well as a healthy lifestyle in humans, combining the notion of...

Wildfire is the primary cause of deforestation in fire-prone environments, disrupting the forest transition process generated by multiple social-ecological drivers of modernization. Given the positive feedback between climate change and wildfire-driven deforestation, it seems necessary to abstract the primary- or micro-characteristics of wildfire e...

Introduction: Christian Orthodox fasting is a pattern high in complex carbohydrates and low in refined carbohydrates. It has been explored in association with its potential health benefits. The present review aims to comprehensively explore the existing available clinical data concerning the potential favorable impact of the dietary pattern of Chr...

The analysis of conservation narratives primarily resides in the methods and techniques of social sciences, focusing mainly on uncovering advocacy versus critical lines of thought in the complex mosaic of arguments around institutional actors and the public. Researchers have previously proposed an archetypal scheme in which the core conservation na...

In pine stands systematic harvesting of forest products, such as resin extraction, are known to affect trees’ vitality and consequently their response to fungal diseases. The latter constitutes a serious threat for standing vigorous trees, thus early warning signals and short diagnosis time of fungal pathogens, are crucial for designing effective f...

Introduction: Nutritional status impacts the survival of patients with cancer. There are few studies that investigate the role of nutritional status on breast cancer survival in women with breast cancer, and even fewer regarding the impact of adhering to the Mediterranean diet (MD). The present study aims to assess the nutritional status, MD adhere...

Hospitals have a responsibility to link human health and the environment, but food waste in hospitals has traditionally been much higher than in other areas of food supply. The cause of this situation has many negative impacts on health, economy, society, and environment. As a result, food waste has become a topic of discussion in hospital food dep...

Urban trees are a fundamental and key component of urban green areas, however, they are subject to several stresses which can compromise their mechanical integrity through the development of defects such as wood decay. In this study, we evaluated the structural health state of trees in four urban parks in the city of Mytilene, Greece, using structu...

This paper examines aspects of the relationship between (1) the recently typified form of biodiversity crime, (2) information made available to the public through the Internet, and (3) cultural dynamics quantified through info-surveillance methods through Culturomics techniques. We propose two conceptual models: (1) the building-up process of a bio...

Conservation of traditional olive groves through effective monitoring of their health state is crucial both at a tree and at a population level. In this study, we introduce a comprehensive methodological framework for estimating the traditional olive grove health state, by considering the fundamental phenotypic, spectral, and thermal traits of the...

This paper examines aspects of the relationship between (1) the recently typified form of biodiversity crime, (2) information made available to the public through the Internet, and (3) cultural dynamics quantified through info-surveillance methods through Culturomics techniques. Two conceptual models are proposed: (1) the building-up process of a b...

Wildfire risk related to hazards on people and assets is expected to increase in the face of climate change, especially in fire-prone environments such as the Mediterranean Basin. Distinguishing rationalities, i.e., the complex profile of multi-thematic, wildfire-related perceptions that collectively characterize and quantify all of a society’s res...

The European Union is the forefront supra-national Institution leading worldwide the environmental and biodiversity conservation strategy evolution. However, European citizens appear as poorly aware of the core relative concepts and policies within the EU’s territory. This paper examines whether: (1) there are ‘imbalances’ in Europeans’ attitudes t...

The generalization that specific seed traits such as dormancy, longevity, or heat-triggered germination of plant species expanding in pyrogenic environments where stochastically but recurrently fire disturbance occurs is a fitness increasing adaptation of obligate seeders dates from the early 20th century. During the last few decades, this hypothes...

Adapting to the growing frequency of catastrophic wildfires in Greece and mitigating their effects is a complex socio-ecological problem. We used an online survey to query more than 100 engaged stakeholders who can potentially influence possible legislation and fire management organizational reform, emphasizing civil protection agencies and researc...

The application of the mass-energy-information equivalence principle developed after the experimentally demonstrated Landauer's principle on thermodynamics, entropy, and information is an unexplored but promising path in search of objectivity and compatibility between strict physical and mathematical entities and relative human behavior in biodiver...

The Mediterranean olive triptych –i.e. the conceptual integration of an ecosystem (the olive-grove), a product (olive-oil) and a nutrition/diet scheme (Mediterranean olive-based diet)– is a discernable cultural model in Europe. In this paper, we attempt to explore the potential and limitations of statistical analysis of compositional data –especial...

This letter is an attempt to indirectly test predictions of a paper to this journal, by Khalatbari-Soltani et al (2020), emphasising the need for SEP factors inclusion in standard WHO’s COVID-19 case reports. We introduce the idea of using UNDP/HDI as predictor of intercountry comparisons of public health performance. Results as is do not confirm t...

The paper presents the case of biodiversity misuse in urban and rural areas of Greece during the years of economic recession (2008–2019). The hypothesis addressed is that if fiscal crisis and economic recession lead to biodiversity misuse, then, even strong conservation strategies such as those allegedly implemented in developed countries may not b...

During the last decade, Conservation culturomics as a new epistemology and source of information on the relationship between conservation science, public interest and social relevance of conservation policies, is steadily emerging. Google Trends culturomics meta-information framework spreads actually in literature. There is however a series of doub...

During the last decades, a large increase of the European wild rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) population (WRP), in Lemnos island (Greece), has become a significant problem, creating imbalances for the biodiversity and ecosystem of the island and inflicting damages in grain crops. This problem affects the local economy, imposing the need for actions...

In urban ecosystems, infrared thermography can accurately estimate arboreal vegetation disturbances and assess their strength and stability loss. In this study, the stress of urban trees and their structural stability was evaluated using infrared thermography. For this purpose, thermal images from nine (9) tree species, along with their morphologic...

Analysis of Google Trends data on Internet crowd-searches regarding biodiversity conservation and global change is steadily developing as a meta-information data stream on public interest in environmental issues and challenges. Literature develops on the validity and multiple determinants of Google Trends, involving a large palette of constraints r...

The problem of siting common interest environmental facilities, in the era of ecological modernization, needs to be reformulated so that could support policies towards internalization of environmental externalities. The technical aspects of the siting problem, which ultimate goal is to propose economically efficient and environmentally suitable lan...

Background & objective: Nutritional culturomics (NCs) is a specific focus area of culturomics epistemology developing digital humanities and computational linguistics approaches to search for macro-patterns of public interest in food, nutrition and diet choice as a major component of cultural evolution. Cultural evolution is considered as a driver...

This contribution focuses on the various uses of the term biotope from a history of science perspective and in the development of concepts in Ecology. Biotope is a division of the landscape (a topographic unit) characterized by similar environmental (physical) conditions and a specific assemblage of plant and animal species. As biotope is examined...

Biodiversity-Ecosystem Function (BEF) research forms a synthetic ecological framework dealing with the intersection of multiple ecological disciplines. Decades of scientific discussion has led in formulating, identifying and modeling the role which biodiversity plays in determining ecosystem functioning. Early BEF research studies had focused on ex...

The Mediterranean Sea is considered a biodiversity hotspot as it supports 7% of all the existing marine species. In particular, the Greek seas located in the Eastern Basin are characterized by high biodiversity, hosting thousands of fish species, seabirds, marine mammals, marine reptiles and invertebrates. Moreover, the Marine Protected Areas (MPAs...

Ecological modernization projects are crucial drivers for transforming economies and territorial policies in small scale islands. Social factors and public behavior are determinants for successful implementation of this transition strategy that refers to several domains in parallel, e.g., energy transition, biodiversity conservation, environmentall...

Urban trees are considered a significant ecological, economic and sociocultural asset of a city’s landscape, as they provide a wide range of ecosystem services, serving important ecological functions, and having positive effects on human well-being. Conversely, rising pollution levels, extreme weather events, drainage problems and root removal, con...

Implementation of conservation plans as the final stage of a long process of institutionalization of modern strategic environmental management theory meets with difficulties in real world conditions. When actual application of scientific principles is confronted with public appreciation and engagement on the ground, the perception per se of—and rea...

The paper introduces the idea of using Google Trends search query volumes for both economic and biodiversity-related terms and keywords as data source in order to produce a composite but simple indicator-early warning sign of public interest in conservation co-evolving with citizens’ concerns about economy and unemployment. The behavior of this ind...

The paper examines a series of critiques and alternative propositions regarding the assumption of declining public interest in biodiversity related issues uncovered by Google Trends of query volumes since 2004. GTs are compared to actual results of public opinion polls among European Union nationals during the period 2004–2016. Critiques are re-exa...

The austerity measures undertaken in Greece to face the 2008 European economic crisis, has led to inefficient implementation of mainstream conservation policies as well as an increase of environmental criminality regarding illegal logging. In addition, there have been difficulties in quantifying and mapping the environmental criminality due to the...

There is arguably a level of institutional growing concern with regard to environmental crime, expressed across the United Nations as well as other intergovernmental agreements and bodies. Despite this concern, practically the necessary steps have not been taken to address with it. In particular, the prosecution of illegal logging is hampered by th...

The importance of parks existing in urban environments is widely recognized, due to the range of ecosystem services which they provide. It is perceptible that these services are inextricably linked to the health of urban park ecosystems, mainly because a fully functional ecosystem is more resistant and resilient to environmental pressures. In gener...

Tree health assessment requires the recognition of multiple different structural defects which probably exist. The most common technique for finding defects in tree trunks is through visual observation but it doesn’t always give accurate results concerning the extent of these defects in the inner tree layers. For this reason, the use of diagnostic...

The importance of parks existing in urban environments is widely recognized, due to the range of ecosystem services which they provide. It is perceptible that these services are inextricably linked to the health of urban park ecosystems, mainly because a fully functional ecosystem is more resistant and resilient to environmental pressures. In gener...

The degradation and loss of ecosystems due to anthropogenic pressures, is considered to be the primary cause which threatens not only biodiversity, but ecosystem services deriving from it as well as. Ecological Restoration is considered to be the most significant management approach which causes or accelerates the recovery of a disturbed ecosystem....

When a country's attempt in economic growth experiences some kind of shock that could undermine and alter this process, the impacts on biodiversity are major. The shock usually derives from political failures that differentiate and lead to misappropriation of the biodiversity resources. Such a policy failure is an economic crisis, whose effects hav...

The importance of parks existing in urban environments is widely recognized, due to the range of ecosystem services which they provide. It is perceptible that these services are inextricably linked to the health of urban park ecosystems, mainly because a fully functional ecosystem is more resistant and resilient to environmental pressures. In gener...

The economic crisis that has affected Greece recently, has questioned the resilience of the biodiversity conservation policy system. The fiscal measures which have been obtained to address it, have led to the misuse of the biodiversity resources and have highlighted the failure of monitoring the effectiveness, the adequacy and the applicability of...

In biodiversity conservation planning a keystone process is the selection of the proper priority area and for that reason many diverse reserve selection (RS) methods have been developed. Usually depending on the chosen method a unique optimum solution is estimated based on the calculation of specific ecological criteria, indicators and algorithms....

This paper reports the findings of a long-term natural invasibility field study, in experimental Mediterranean grasslands of varying initial diversities and compositions. The study aims to explore the relationship between the initial planted species richness and composition, and the various invasibility components five years after the cessation of...

We used remote sensing and GIS in conjunction with multivariate statistical methods to: (i) quantify landscape composition (land cover types) and configuration (patch density, diversity, fractal dimension, contagion) for five coastal watersheds of Kalloni gulf, Lesvos Island, Greece, in 1945, 1960, 1971, 1990 and 2002/2003, (ii) evaluate the relati...

Nature provides life-support services which do not merely constitute the basis for ecosystem integrity but also benefit human societies. The importance of such multiple outputs is often ignored or underestimated in environmental planning and decision making. The economic valuation of ecosystem functions or services has been widely used to make thes...

Insurance effects of biodiversity can stabilize the functioning of multispecies ecosystems against environmental variability when differential species’ responses lead to asynchronous population dynamics. When responses are not perfectly positively correlated, declines in some populations are compensated by increases in others, smoothing variability...

Biological invasions by alien plants constitute a serious threat to biodiversity, causing species loss of the affected communities. Plant invaders can also have impacts on ecosystem functioning, altering the observed diversity-productivity patterns of local plant communities.We conducted a three-year study in herbaceous vegetation understory of oli...

Aim To explore potential shifts in vegetation and fire regime in some dominant forest types in the north-eastern part of the Mediterranean basin under climate change. Location Two altitudinal gradients in the continental part of Greece. Methods We developed a forest gap dynamics simulator that provides feedback from the stand to its water balance a...

The islands of the Mediterranean Basin probably represent some of the ecosystems globally most at risk from invasive species. Compared to neighbouring mainland areas, island floras have a signifi-cantly higher proportion of alien plant species. Yet the circumstances that have led to this situation and the subsequent consequences of plant invasions...

This contribution focuses on the various uses of the term biotope from a history of science perspective and in the development of concepts in Ecology. Biotope is a division of the landscape (a topographic unit) characterized by similar environmental (physical) conditions and a specific assemblage of plant and animal species. As biotope is examined...

Understanding the relative importance of the abiotic environment and species interactions in determining the distribution and abundance of organisms has been a challenge in ecological research. Serpentine substrata are stressful environments for plant growth due to multiple limitations, collectively called the "serpentine syndrome". In the present...

Although some invasive plants are cosmopolitan, not all ecosystems are invaded to the same degree. Yet there is little experimental work on how ecosystem resistance to invasion at the establishment phase differs among ecosystems. We conducted two field sowing experiments in two consecutive years to examine establishment of the deciduous tree Ailant...

The aim of this study is to determine the competing regeneration and expansion patterns of two co-occurring pine species (Pinus brutia, Pinus nigra ssp. pallasiana), in a transitional montane Mediterranean zone. We measured the regeneration density of all woody species in 102 randomly located stands along an altitudinal gradient on the island of Le...

Since the success of an invasive species depends not only upon its intrinsic traits but also on particular characteristics of the recipient habitat, assessing the performance of an invader across habitats provides a more realistic analysis of risk. Such an analysis will not only provide insights into the traits related to invasiveness, but also the...

1 -Using five coastal wetland systems across Kalloni bay, Lesvos Island, NE Aegean, we investigated: (I) the interaction between spatial units (land, wetland, sea) and seasons (spring, autumn) of substratum physicochemical attributes, vegetation composition and aerial cover, and substratum macroinvertebrates distribution and abundance and (II) the...

Coastal wetlands are regarded as transitional ecosystems regulating fluxes of materials and energy between 1 - the land and the sea and are protected habitats under the NATURA 2000 European network of protected areas. Description of spatial heterogeneity in abiotic and biotic constituents of coastal wetland systems is a prerequisite for the establi...

This paper reports the findings of a long-term natural invasibility field study in constructed Mediterranean herbaceous communities of varying initial diversities and compositions. We kept the local species pools of experimental grassland resident communities with 1, 2, 4, 8, and 18 species closed for three years and subsequently opened them for in...

Biodiversity and ecosystem functioning research has been some of the most controversial of the last decade but rapid progress has been made by deriving hypotheses from the differing view points and challenging them with appropriate experimental and analytical tests (Loreau et al. 2001). Here we address some recent criticisms of the BIODEPTH project...

This paper describes the development of a model, able to simulate the dynamics of typical mountainous Mediterranean ecosystems, following the forest gap dynamics framework. The model has been adapted to the bioclimatic conditions and species traits of the Northeastern part of the Mediterranean Basin, based on forest inventories and climate data fro...

The present work aimed at studying the effect of Oxalis pes-caprae invasion in the herbaceous understory of olive groves in the island of Lesvos, Greece. The number of species, their biomass and dead plant material production was followed throughout the vegetative period in invaded and non-invaded plots. Species richness in the area invaded by O. p...

This paper describes the development of a model, able to simulate the dynamics of typical mountainous Mediterranean ecosystems, following the forest gap dynamics framework. The model has been adapted to the bioclimatic conditions and species traits of the North-eastern part of the Mediterranean Basin, based on forest inventories and climate data fr...

Alternative tourism signals a new era of tourism development and policy in Greece, especially for disadvantaged regions such as the Region of North Aegean. The dive industry is an attractive choice of investment given its significant market and the opportunities it provides for qualitative upgrading of tourism, entrance into new markets, and extens...

Despite the large amount of information on different aspects of biological invasions, we still know quite little about how the same invader performs in different areas of the world. Having such information and determining the mechanisms underlying such differences is crucial if we want to understand what are the factors intrinsic to the invaded are...

We conducted a field experiment using constructed communities to test whether species richness contributed to the maintenance of ecosystem processes under fire disturbance. We studied the effects of diversity components (i.e., species richness and species composition) upon productivity, structural traits of vegetation, decomposition rates, and soil...

Aims Although biological invasions occur throughout the world, and some invaders are widespread in many habitats, few studies on the ecological impact of invaders have examined multiple sites. We tested how the impact of three widespread plant invaders changed depending on the identity of the species and the invaded island. We also tested whether r...

Aims Although biological invasions occur throughout the world, and some invaders are widespread in many habitats, few studies on the ecological impact of invaders have examined multiple sites. We tested how the impact of three widespread plant invaders changed depending on the identity of the species and the invaded island. We also tested whether r...

We present a multisite analysis of the relationship between plant diversity and ecosystem functioning within the European BIODEPTH network of plant-diversity manipulation experiments. We report results of the analysis of 11 variables addressing several aspects of key ecosystem processes like biomass production, resource use (space, light, and nitro...

This paper reports the findings of a short-term natural invasibility field study in constructed Mediterranean herbaceous communities of varying diversities, under a fire treatment. Three components of invasibility, i.e. species richness, density and biomass of invaders, have been monitored in burnt and unburnt experimental plots with resident diver...

Aim This study examines the effectiveness of the selected ‘network’ of Natura 2000 Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) at a regional scale in Greece, in terms of its representativeness of plant biodiversity. Location The island of Crete is used as a case study because it is considered to be one of the 10 hotspots for biodiversity in the Mediterran...

The applicability of a modified, easily constructed litterbag is evaluated in this study. In this litterbag, designed for use in decomposition studies involving litter mixtures, litter species are decomposed in separated by mesh compartments so that they can interact with adjacent species and at the same time can be retrieved “non-contaminated” by...

Recent experimental evidence on the relationship between temperature and litter or soil organic matter decomposition suggests that the simple assumption that temperature affects the rate constant of the processes may not be valid. Thermal conditions seem to influence the kinetics of C mineralization by changing, in a qualitatively predictable way,...