Demetra Rakosy

• Doctor of Philosophy
• PostDoc Position at Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research

Artificial intelligence (AI) surpasses human accuracy in identifying ordinary objects, but it is still challenging for AI to be competitive in pollen grain identification. One reason for this gap is the extensive trait variation in pollen grains. In classical textbooks, pollen size relies on only 25–50 pollen grains, mostly for one plant and site....

Flowers and their pollinators represent a bipartite interaction system, whose links are hypothesised to be related to species traits. To explore whether we can predict the weight of this link, i.e. the frequency of interactions, in an validation network, we analysed 14 studies of pollinator-flower visitation network from around the world. We used i...

Motivation Pollinators play a crucial role in maintaining Earth's terrestrial biodiversity. However, rapid human‐induced environmental changes are compromising the long‐term persistence of plant‐pollinator interactions. Unfortunately, we lack robust, generalisable data capturing how plant‐pollinator communities are structured across space and time....

Monitoring plant-pollinator interactions is crucial for understanding the factors influencing these relationships across space and time. Traditional methods in pollination ecology are resource-intensive, while time-lapse photography offers potential for non-destructive and automated complementary techniques. However, accurate identification of poll...

Tomares nogelii, a butterfly considered extinct in the European Union (EU) until its rediscovery in 2014, has recently been found in southeastern Romania. These populations belong to the western endemic subspecies, T. nogelii dobrogensis. In this study, we provide a comprehensive description of this subspecies, detailing its life history traits and...

Background Land management change towards intensive grazing has been shown to alter plant and pollinator communities and the structure of plant-pollinator interactions in different ways across the world. Land-use intensification in Eastern Europe is shifting highly diverse, traditionally managed hay meadows towards intensive pastures, but few studi...

Monitoring plant-pollinator interactions is crucial for understanding factors that influence these relationships across space and time. While traditional methods in pollination ecology are time-consuming and resource-intensive, the growing availability of photographic technology, coupled with advancements in artificial intelligence classification,...

Plant–pollinator interactions are ecologically and economically important, and, as a result, their prediction is a crucial theoretical and applied goal for ecologists. Although various analytical methods are available, we still have a limited ability to predict plant–pollinator interactions. The predictive ability of different plant–pollinator inte...

Among terrestrial orchids, and particularly among the subtribe Orchidinae, flies are underrepresented as pollinators. The European Neotinea ustulata, which developed specialized pollination by tachinid flies, is known to produce high relative concentrations of the floral cuticular alkenes (Z)-11-tricosene and (Z)-11-pentacosene (referred to as (Z)-...

Quantitative assessments of endemism, evolutionary distinctiveness and extinction threat underpin global conservation prioritization for well-studied taxa, such as birds, mammals, and amphibians. However, such information is unavailable for most of the world’s taxa. This is the case for the Orchidaceae, a hyperdiverse and cosmopolitan family with i...

The Omusati region belongs to historic Ovamboland, an area of northern Namibia populated by tribes of the Ovambo group. Four very large African baobabs of Omusati played an important role in historic events of the area, such as the tribal wars and the Namibian War of Independence. The four historic baobabs are the Ombalantu baobab (8 stems; circumf...

Mutualistic interactions between plants and animal pollinators are increasingly under threat through anthropogenic change, and it is critical to understand how temporal changes affect the structure and function of these ecologically important interactions. Because the responses of plant–pollinator interactions to anthropogenic change may take place...

Environmental monitoring involves the quantification of microscopic cells and particles such as algae, plant cells, pollen, or fungal spores. Traditional methods using conventional microscopy require expert knowledge, are time‐intensive and not well‐suited for automated high throughput. Multispectral imaging flow cytometry (MIFC) allows measurement...

Complex socio-economic, political and demographic factors have driven the increased conversion of Europe’s semi-natural grasslands to intensive pastures. This trend is particularly strong in some of the most biodiverse regions of the continent, such as Central and Eastern Europe. Intensive grazing is known to decrease species diversity and alter th...

National and local governments need to step up efforts to effectively implement the post‐2020 global biodiversity framework of the Convention on Biological Diversity to halt and reverse worsening biodiversity trends. Drawing on recent advances in interdisciplinary biodiversity science, we propose a framework for improved implementation by national...

Societal Impact Statement Pollen relates to many aspects of human and environmental health, which protection and improvement are endorsed by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. By highlighting these connections in the frame of current challenges in monitoring and research, we discuss the need of more integrative and multidisciplinary...

Despite increased focus on elucidating the various reproductive strategies employed by orchids, we still have only a rather limited understanding of deceptive pollination systems that are not bee- or wasp-mediated. In Europe, the orchid Neotinea ustulata has been known to consist of two phenologically divergent varieties, neither of which provide r...

Records from Austria, Hungary, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova collected in the last 30 years suggest that Xestia sextrigata (Haworth, 1809) is extending its range towards South-Eastern Europe. Here we report the first genuine record of X. sextrigata from Romania. Older records from the literature are shown to be erroneous.

Pollen identification and quantification are crucial but challenging tasks in addressing a variety of evolutionary and ecological questions (pollination, paleobotany), but also for other fields of research (e.g. allergology, honey analysis or forensics). Researchers are exploring alternative methods to automate these tasks but, for several reasons,...

Rakosy, D., Paulus, H.F. & M. Hirth (2020): Ophrys dimidiata, a hitherto undescribed species of the Ophrys tenthredinifera complex in Crete (Orchidaceae).- J. Eur. Orch. 52 (1): 207-226. According to current knowledge there are three different species within the Ophrys tenthredinifera complex on the island Crete. DELFORGE (2005) had described two...

Sexual deception has evolved repeatedly within the Orchidaceae. All species exploit the sexual communication system of insects; they rely on a combination of olfactory, visual and tactile signals for tempting mate‐searching males into copulation attempts with their flowers. The exploitation of their pollinator's private communication channel ensure...

Anthropogenic environmental change disrupts interactions between plants and their animal pollinators. To assess the importance of different drivers, baseline information is needed on interaction networks and plant reproductive success around the world. We conducted a systematic literature review to determine the state of our knowledge on plant–poll...

Anthropogenic environmental change disrupts interactions between plants and their animal pollinators. To assess the importance of different drivers, baseline information is needed on interaction networks and plant reproductive success around the world. We conducted a systematic literature review to determine the state of our knowledge on plant-poll...

Many species of the sexually-deceptive genus Ophrys are characterized by insect-like flowers. Their form has been traditionally considered to play an important role in pollinator attraction and manipulation. Yet the evolution of the floral form remains insufficiently understood. We hypothesize that pollinator-mediated selection is essential for dri...

Ophrys flowers mimic sex pheromones of attractive females of their pollinators and attract males, which attempt to copulate with the flower and thereby pollinate it. Virgin females and orchid flowers are known to use the same chemical compounds in order to attract males. The composition of the sex pheromone and its floral analogue, however, vary be...

Epipogium aphyllum, Malaxis monophyllos and Hammarbya paludosa are among the rarest and less studied European orchid species. Even as several recent studies have greatly contributed to the understanding of their pollination biology, there are still many aspects which have not been sufficiently addressed. The present project aims to study the reprod...

Orchids are among the most fascinating plants in the rain forest. With over 230 species, they are also the most diverse plant family in the Golfo Dulce region of Costa Rica. This guidebook is an introduction to the world of orchids: the text and numerous colour photographs provide essential information for identifying the most common and conspicuou...

Sexually deceptive orchids mimic signals emitted by female insects in order to attract mate-searching males. Specific attraction of the targeted pollinator is achieved by sex pheromone mimicry, which constitutes the major attraction channel. In close vicinity of the flower, visual signals may enhance attraction, as was shown recently in the sexuall...

he aim of this paper was to analyze some aspects of the population biology of Ophrys sphegodes near the locality of Tinaud, Bihor region. This population was first mentioned, and documented with herbarium specimens, by Dr Gh. Coldea in 1968, but not studied since. This is the only description of Ophrys sphegodes known so far from Romania. Our study...