Panayiotis Pafilis

National and Kapodistrian University of Athens | uoa · Division of Biology

Reproductive investment, including the number of offspring produced, is one of the fundamental characteristics of a species. It is particularly important for island vertebrates, which face a disproportionate number of threats to their survival, because it predicts, among other things, a species’ resilience to environmental disruption. Taxa producin...

Simple Summary The ability of animals to maintain their body temperature within an optimal range, known as thermoregulation, is essential for their survival, overall health, and daily activities. Ectotherms, including reptiles, rely on external energy resources to regulate their body temperature. How well they can achieve this, heavily depends on v...

Simple Summary As ectotherms that do not produce metabolic heat to regulate their body temperature, lizards largely rely on the thermal quality of the environment for most aspects of their biology. To compensate for geographically induced changes in the thermal environment, different lizard populations within a single species should either regulate...

Simple Summary Small island environments can drive rapid changes in animal traits that provide an advantage for individuals attempting to capitalize on scarce resources. One such trait for lizards is bite force—individuals with stronger bites may be better able to access food that is hard to chew and/or guard access to food and territories from com...

The feeding ecology of the frog genus Pelophylax in Greece presents knowledge gaps and corresponding research is limited to a few areas. The aim of the present study is to investigate the diet of two frog species (P. kurtmuelleri, P. epeiroticus) in areas of central and western Greece. We collected food items from 257 frog specimens that were colle...

The Karpathos water frog (Pelophylax cerigensis) is classified as Critically Endangered according to the IUCN Red List and its distribution is restricted on the island of Karpathos, South Aegean Sea. Utilizing a next generation sequencing approach, we obtained whole mitochondrial genomes of P. cerigensis to determine the species phylogenetic positi...

Temperature rules the lives of ectotherms. To perform basic biological functions, ectotherms must make behavioral adjustments to keep their body temperatures near a preferred temperature (Tpref). Many color polymorphic lizards are active thermoregulators and exhibit morph differences in traits related to thermoregulation, such as color, body size,...

As ectotherms, lizards, among the best models in thermal studies, are influenced by many abiotic factors. Interestingly, there is a scarcity of data regarding the impact that insularity may have on thermoregulation. Islands, depending their size and altitude, may differ considerably in the thermal conditions they provide to lizards. Here, we focuse...

Urban habitats receive an increasing number of species due to anthropogenic activities, mainly transportations. Here, we report a new addition to the herpetofauna of Athens (Greece): a small population of the Pelasgian wall lizard (Anatololacerta pelasgiana) was found in a suburb of the Athenian metropolitan area. The species normally occurs in so...

Temperature rules the lives of ectotherms. To perform basic biological functions, ectotherms must make behavioral adjustments to keep their body temperatures near a preferred temperature (Tpref). Many color polymorphic lizards are active thermoregulators and exhibit morph differences in traits related to thermoregulation, such as color, body size,...

Organisms adapt to their environment by adopting appropriate shifts in morphological, physiological or behavioral features. Water-dependent species, such as amphibians, are largely affected by the overall quality of water bodies. Low-elevation wetlands near big cities and areas with intense human activities receive stronger pressures than less popu...

Space is a limited resource in which many animals need to perform basic functions such as feeding and reproducing. Competition over access to space can induce a variety of behaviours that may result in differential access to crucial resources related to survival and fitness. The Aegean wall lizard, Podarcis erhardii, is a colour-polymorphic lizard...

Cognition is an essential tool for animals to deal with environmental challenges. Nonetheless, the ecological forces driving the evolution of cognition throughout the animal kingdom remain enigmatic. Large‐scale comparative studies on multiple species and cognitive traits have been advanced as the best way to facilitate our understanding of cogniti...

Most ungulate mammals are social species that live in large groups where agonistic encounters with con‐specifics are common. Such interactions may be a source of distress and can pose a threat to group's cohesion. Group stability may be achieved by third‐party interventions, defined as the behavior of individuals (interveners) interrupting agonisti...

Animals exhibit considerable and consistent among-individual variation in cognitive abilities, even within a population. Recent studies have attempted to address this variation using insights from the field of animal personality. Generally, it is predicted that animals with “faster” personalities (bolder, explorative, and neophilic) should exhibit...

Recently, biologists have become increasingly interested in cognitive variation among individuals and how it relates to differences in fitness. However, very few studies so far have studied the long-term repeatability and heritability of cognitive performance in wild animals. This is nevertheless crucial information to fully understand the potentia...

Gut passage time (GPT), a key factor in digestive procedure, is of pivotal importance for digestion. Sev- eral parameters may affect GPT, such as temperature, length of gastrointestinal tract and body size. Here, we exam- ine the influence of prey weight and prey species on GPT in the endemic diurnal gecko Quedenfeldtia moerens, from the Anti-Atlas...

Situated at the junction of three continents, Europe, Asia and Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean is an ideal region to study the effects of palaeogeography, ecology and long human presence on animal evolution. Laudakia stellio (Squamata: Agamidae) is found across this region and offers an excellent opportunity for such studies. The high morphologic...

Over-water dispersal to small islets is an important eco-evolutionary process. Most often, new arrivals on islets find the environment harsh or mate-less, making their footholds on these islets fleeting. Occasionally, introduced animals are able to survive the strong selection following their arrival, leading to subsequent propagation and, in sever...

Lethocerinae water bugs are vertebrate predators that include in their diet large prey such as fish, turtles, snakes and frogs. Although frog consumption is common among the members of the genus Lethocerus, similar reports are unknown from Europe. Here we report a predation event by an adult Lethocerus patruelis (Stål, 1854) on a subadult Balkan wa...

The Mediterranean Basin has experienced extensive change in geology and climate over the past six million years. Yet, the relative importance of key geological events for the distribution and genetic structure of the Mediterranean fauna remains poorly understood. Here, we use population genomic and phylogenomic analyses to establish the evolutionar...

Understanding the genomic basis of adaptation to different abiotic environments is important in the context of climate change and resulting short‐term environmental fluctuations. Using functional and comparative genomics approaches, we here investigated whether signatures of genomic adaptation to a set of environmental parameters are concentrated i...

Though biological invasions constitute one of the biggest threats for global biodiversity, our understanding of the mechanisms that enable invasive species to outperform native species is still limited, especially, in terms of behavior. Most available studies have examined behavioral traits which favor invasive species on the later stages of invasi...

Body size evolution on islands is widely studied and hotly debated. Gigantism and dwarfism are thought to evolve under strong natural selection, especially on small remote islands. We report a curious co-occurrence of both dwarf and giant lizards on the same small, remote island (Plakida): the largest Podarcis erhardii (Lacertidae) and smallest Med...

The Mediterranean Basin has experienced extensive change in geology and climate over the past six million years. Yet, the relative importance of key geological events for the distribution and genetic structure of the Mediterranean fauna remains poorly understood. Here, we use population genomic and phylogenomic analyses to establish the evolutionar...

Populations of the same species occupying different microhabitats can either exhibit generalized traits across them or display intraspecific variability, adapting to each microhabitat in order to maximize performance. Intraspecific variability contributes to the generation of diversity, following selection and adaptation, and understanding such var...

Our knowledge of the conservation status of reptiles, the most diverse class of terrestrial vertebrates, has improved dramatically over the past decade, but still lags behind that of the other tetrapod groups. Here, we conduct the first comprehensive evaluation (~92% of the world's ~1714 described species) of the conservation 1 Joint senior authors...

Harsh and variable environments have been hypothesized to both drive and constrain the evolution towards higher cognitive abilities and behavioural flexibility. In this study, we compared the cognitive abilities of island and mainland Aegean wall lizards ( Podarcis erhardii ), which were expected to live in respectively a more variable and a more s...

The Lichadonisia island group is located between Maliakos and the North Evian Gulf, in central Greece. Lichadonisia is one of the few volcanic island groups of Greece, consisting mainly of lava flows. Today the islands are uninhabited with high numbers of visitors, but permanent population existed for many decades in the past. Herein, we present fo...

Tissue regeneration is a fundamental evolutionary adaptation, which is well known in lizards that can regenerate their entire tail. However, numerous parameters of this process remain poorly understood. Lizard tail serves many functions. Thus, tail autotomy comes with many disadvantages and the need for quick regeneration is imperative. To provide...

Terrestrial reptiles are threatened by numerous anthropogenic activities, including agriculture. Many agricultural methods and techniques affect the herpetofauna located in the oldest known tree crops in the Mediterranean Basin, olive trees. For the first time, we present a case of unintentional capture (and killing) of 12 snake-eyed skinks Ablepha...

Although the insular distribution of the rich herpetofauna of Greece has been studied more extensively, the mainland one is still underexplored. The region of Attica in central Greece represents one of these “black spots” in the mainland. Thus, in 2019 we surveyed for the first time the herpetofauna of Attica in a systematic way. We collected 794 f...

A bilingual guide to the nature and biodiversity of the Small Cycladic Islands for visitors and hikers (in Greek and English).

Color polymorphism defies evolutionary expectations as striking phenotypic variation is maintained within a single species. Color and other traits mediate social interactions, and stable polymorphism within a population is hypothesized to be related to correlational selection of other phenotypic traits among color morphs. Here, we report on a previ...

Infectious diseases are major drivers of biodiversity loss. The risk of fungal diseases to the survival of threatened animals in nature is determined by a complex interplay between host, pathogen and environment. We here predict the risk of invasion of populations of threatened Mediterranean salamanders of the genus Lyciasalamandra by the pathogeni...

In this note we report for the first time the occurrence of the Roughtail Rock Agama (Stellagama stellio) from Kaprathos Island, Greece. Greece represents the westernmost range limit of the animal and hosts its only European populations. Although Karpathos is a relatively well-studied island in terms of its herpetofauna, this is the second remarkab...

Centipedes feed mainly on insects and other invertebrates. However, they may occasionally enhance their diet with small vertebrates. Lizard consumption by centipedes is rather rare. Here, we report an incident of saurophagy by the most common Mediterranean scolopendrid, Scolopendra cingulata, on the Aegean wall lizard, Podarcis erhardii. Island par...

A small but growing population of the Dalmatian Algyroides (Algyroides nigropunctatus) was found in a suburb of Athens (Greece), a long way from the species’ known range. This apparently introduced population increases the number of new lizard species documented in the Athens metropolitan area during the past few years.

Lacertid lizards are a widely radiated group of squamate reptiles with long-term stable ZZ/ZW sex chromosomes. Despite their family-wide homology of Z-specific gene content, previous cytogenetic studies revealed significant variability in the size, morphology, and heterochromatin distribution of their W chromosome. However, there is little evidence...

Studies of animal communication have documented myriad rapid, context-dependent changes in visual and acoustic signal design. In contrast, relatively little is known about the capacity of vertebrate chemical signals to rapidly respond, either plastically or deterministically, to changes in context. Four years following an experimental introduction...

Insular animals are thought to be under weak predation pressure and increased intraspecific competition compared with those on the mainland. Thus, insular populations are predicted to evolve 'slow' life histories characterized by fewer and smaller clutches of larger eggs, a pattern called the 'island syndrome'. To test this pattern, we collected da...

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The Karpathos frog (Pelophylax cerigensis) is one of the most narrow-endemic species of European amphibians, with a very restricted distribution in th eisland of Karpathos, Greece. Currently, only two populations are recorded from small streams in the northern part of the island and a few individuals have been located in a reservoir. It appears tha...

Abstract Herein we present the recently founded Hellenic Evolutionary Society (HEVOS) that has been recently instituted to promote evolution and scientific thinking among the Greek-speaking public. HEVOS is a timely initiative, given the low levels of acceptance of evolution by Greek society and the almost complete lack of evolution teaching in pri...

Context Islands harbor unique and sensitive wildlife. Little is currently known, however, on how touristic development affects island species. We analyzed how tourism-associated infrastructure impacts wildlife and habitat availability across a representative Mediterranean island landscape (Naxos, Aegean Sea, Greece). Objectives First, we aimed to...

Aim Isolation is a key factor in island biology. It is usually defined as the distance to the geographically nearest mainland, but many other definitions exist. We explored how testing different isolation indices affects the inference of impacts of isolation on faunal characteristics. We focused on land bridge islands and compared the relationships...

Climatic conditions changing over time and space shape the evolution of organisms at multiple levels, including temperate lizards in the family Lacertidae. Here we reconstruct a dated phylogenetic tree of 262 lacertid species based on a supermatrix relying on novel phylogenomic datasets and fossil calibrations. Diversification of lacertids was acco...

Though invasive species constitute one of the biggest threats for global biodiversity, little is known on the putative advantages that make invasive species to outperform the equivalent native species in terms of behavior. The Italian wall lizard (Podarcis siculus) has been widely introduced and established viable populations in many countries incl...

Understanding the genomic basis of adaptation to different abiotic environments is important for understanding organismal responses to current short-term environmental fluctuations. Using functional and comparative genomics approaches, we here investigated whether genomic adaptation to a set of environmental parameters is contingent across vertebra...

Invasive species have been recognised as an important hazard to native communities. Amongst the mitigation measures that have been proposed to confront biological invasions, eradication projects are certainly the most drastic. In this short communication, a successful eradication project against a recently established population of the Italian wall...

Environmental factors may affect animal performance in diverse ways, even among different populations of a single species. Here, we assess the impact of substrate type on the sprint performance (maximum speed and acceleration) of Schreiber's fringe-fingered lizard (Acanthodactylus schreiberi). This species is a skillful runner that also bears micro...

Both environmental temperatures and spatial heterogeneity can profoundly affect the biology of ectotherms. In lizards, thermoregulation may show high plasticity and may respond to environmental shifts. In the context of global climate change, lizards showing plastic thermoregulatory responses may be favored. In this study, we designed an experiment...

Studies on life history characters are of pivotal importance to understand population dynamics and demography and, if required, to propose effective conservation measures. The Balkan green lizard (Lacerta trilineata) is the most widespread lizard species in the Balkans but, interestingly, there are no studies on its reproductive biology. Herein, we...

The Karpathos marsh frog (Pelophylax cerigensis) is considered the most endangered frog in Europe. Here we assess its feeding ecology and examine 76 individuals from the two known populations using the stomach flushing method. We also measured body weight, snout–vent length, mouth width and prey width and length. Pelophylax cerigensis follows the f...

The major histocompatibility complex (MHC) has long served as a model for the evolution of adaptive genetic diversity in wild populations. Pathogen-mediated selection is thought to be a main driver of MHC diversity, but it remains elusive to what degree selection shapes MHC diversity in complex biogeographical scenarios where other evolutionary pro...

Various factors may alter anti-predatory responses among conspecifics. Here we assess some of these factors using three populations of a Mediterranean lizard (Acanthodactylus schreiberi) in Cyprus that differ in their habitat type, predator diversity and population density. We expected that predation would affect flight initiation distance (FID; th...

The genus Pelophylax, which currently comprises 26 species, is a well studied group due to its complex history and high diversification, although some phylogenies remain unresolved. Here we assess the phylogenetic position and the population genetic structure of the Critically Endangered Karpathos frog, Pelophylax cerigensis, endemic to Karpathos I...

Aegean Islands host a rich herpetofauna comprising a plethora of endemic taxa. Since the early 19th century, this unique diversity attracted numerous herpetologists that described the Greek species and provided records of their distribution. Interestingly, many new records on insular ranges are still added to the literature every year. During the l...

In this document we present the discovery of a new established population of the Moorish Gecko (Tarentola mauritanica) in Athens at the regions of Sepolia and Aigaleo. This is the first time the species is reported in mainland Greece, outside its known distribution in the W Peloponnese. As a strongly synanthropic species, the Moorish Gecko must hav...

Effective thermoregulation is of vital importance since body temperature affects virtually all physiological and biochemical processes. Yet, our current knowledge in reptilian thermoregulation is largely based on a few, well-studied taxonomic groups. This is especially true in Europe, where our insights derive primarily from studies on the numerous...

In this study we aimed to clarify the identity of a wall lizard population that deviates phenotypically from the other Podarcis lizards that occur in the broader area (Athens, Greece). To this end we used molecular techniques. Most surprisingly, we identified the focal population as Podarcis vaucheri, a species far away from its natural range. Mole...