Špela Di Batista Borko

University of Graz | KFU Graz · Institut für Biologie

Sexual dimorphism can evolve in response to sex-specific selection pressures that vary across habitats. We studied sexual differences in subterranean amphipods Niphargus living in shallow subterranean habitats (close to the surface), cave streams (intermediate), and cave lakes (deepest, and most isolated). These three habitats differ because at gre...

Groundwater is a vital ecosystem of the global water cycle, hosting unique biodiversity and providing essential services to societies. Despite being the largest unfrozen freshwater resource, in a period of depletion by extraction and pollution, groundwater environments have been repeatedly overlooked in global biodiversity conservation agendas. Dis...

The upper Neretva River valley with river and tributaries, preserved forests, natural caves and buildings represents a very interesting area for bats. During two field expeditions in summer 2022, we collected data on bats using a variety of methods: inspecting the potential roosts, mist netting, and recording bat echolocation calls. We used manual...

The Dinarides in the Western Balkans host a globally exceptional subterranean biodiversity, but still areas remain with little or no data on subterranean species. In this work, we present the study of subterranean fauna in the upper Neretva River catchment (Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina), which included the first systematic exploration of the inte...

Many rivers in the Balkans are at risk due to numerous planned hydropower plants. The Save the Blue Heart of Europe campaign and the Scientists for Balkan Rivers network are important initiatives trying to promote the protection of the region’s intact rivers. In summer 2022, a Science Week was organised in the upper Neretva River valley. From 26.6....

Redkokdaj narava sama ponudi in očisti redke in zanimive fosile. Enega takšnih primerkov smo našli tudi v globini brezna pod Toscem v Julijskih Alpah. Ob skrbnem pregledovanju so jamarji odkrili tudi naravno izlužene in odlično ohranjene ostanke triasnih polžev, ki predstavljajo edinstveni vpogled v redko predstavljeno favno dachsteinskih apnencev.

Redkokdaj narava sama ponudi in očisti redke in zanimive fosile. Enega takšnih primerkov smo našli tudi v globini brezna pod Toscem v Julijskih Alpah. Ob skrbnem pregledovanju so jamarji odkrili tudi naravno izlužene in odlično ohranjene ostanke triasnih polžev, ki predstavljajo edinstveni vpogled v redko predstavljeno favno dachsteinskih apnencev.

Climate change affects all ecosystems, but subterranean ecosystems are repeatedly neglected from political and public agendas. Cave habitats are home to unknown and endangered species, with low trait variability and intrinsic vulnerability to recover from human-induced disturbances. We studied the annual variability and cyclicity of temperatures in...

Water mites are a diverse but neglected meiofaunal group in interstitial habitats. In this study, water mites were sampled from the hyporheic zone of the upper Neretva river catchment in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In total, 10 obligate subterranean (hyporheobiontic) species were detected. Seven of them, i.e. Atractides pumilus (Szalay, 1946), Frontipo...

Aim: Morphologically cryptic species are an important part of global biodiversity, yet it remains unclear how these species contribute to and integrate into communities at different geographic scales. It is especially unclear at which scales they co-occur, and if and how their ranges overlap. To adequately protect biodiversity, an accurate understa...

Species performance depends on the concerted interplay of their functional traits. Natural selection acts on the performance of the species and influences entire suits of interdependent functional traits, thereby driving the evolution of functional diversity (FD) within a clade. In a given habitat, interdependent functional traits are expected to i...

Subterranean fauna is an important contributor to the global fauna, but it is still understudied, and a large part of its taxonomy is not yet resolved. One species complex with unresolved taxonomy is the groundwater amphipod Niphargus ruffoi, endemic to the Alpine chain. Here, we used new samples from across the Alpine arc to review the taxonomic s...

The Neretva Science Week was held in conjunction with the initiative “Save the Blue Heart of Europe” and the project “Scientists for Balkan Rivers”, which investigated the upper reaches of the Neretva River. The Neretva River and its surroundings are of great importance for bats due to the diversity of forest and underground ecosystems, canyon habi...

Range size is one of the most important criteria for determining species conservation status. It is an outcome of multiple factors, including a species' ecological tolerance and propensity to disperse, availability and temporal stability of suitable habitat patches, and between‐patch connectivity. Understanding the determinants of range size could...

The Palaearctic genus Niphargus is a promising model system to understand subterranean fauna genesis in Europe. The Pannonian Plain (mainly covered by Hungary) in Central Europe, once being the area of the Paratethys, is a key area for Niphargus diversification. However, our knowledge on Hungarian species of Niphargus is primarily based on sporadic...

Groundwater is a vital ecosystem of the global water cycle, hosting unique biodiversity and providing essential services to societies. Despite being the largest unfrozen freshwater resource, in a period of depletion by extraction and pollution, groundwater environments have been repeatedly overlooked in global biodiversity conservation agendas. Dis...

Quaternary climate fluctuations can affect speciation in regional biodiversity assembly in two non-mutually exclusive ways: a glacial species pump, where isolation in glacial refugia accelerates allopatric speciation, and adaptive radiation in underused adaptive zones during ice-free periods. We detected biogeographic and genetic signatures associa...

Aim Groundwater harbours an exceptional fauna and provides invaluable ecosystem services, yet is among the least explored and consequently least protected ecosystems. Successful protection of its biodiversity depends on complete species inventories, knowledge of species spatial distribution, and quantification of biodiversity patterns, as well as d...

Groundwater presents the main source of potable water in Europe, but it is also a home to many specialized species. Current monitoring schemes of groundwater do not include the biotic component. Studies and conservation of groundwater fauna are challenging. Sampling techniques are demanding and due to low species detectability, multiple visits are...

Quaternary climate fluctuations can affect biodiversity assembly through speciation in two non-mutually-exclusive ways: a glacial species pump, where isolation in glacial refugia accelerates allopatric speciation, and adaptive radiation during ice-free periods. Here we detected biogeographic and genetic signatures associated with both mechanisms in...

Sex allocation theory predicts that the proportion of daughters to sons will evolve in response to ecological conditions that determine the costs and benefits of producing each sex. All else being equal, the adult sex ratio (ASR) should also vary with ecological conditions. Many studies of subterranean species reported female‐biased ASR, but no sys...

Identifying the relationships between morphology and trophic niche is at the core of functional morphology. Low resource diversity and fluxes of organic carbon are expected to constrain trophic specialisation of morphological structures because food resources are too scarce to promote trophic differentiation. However, species from low‐productivity...

Adaptive radiations are bursts of evolutionary species diversification that have contributed to much of the species diversity on Earth. An exception is modern Europe, where descendants of ancient adaptive radiations went extinct, and extant adaptive radiations are small, recent and narrowly confined. However, not all legacy of old radiations has be...

Knowledge on the diversity and distribution of subterranean organisms is still scattered, even in faunistically relatively well-researched countries such as Switzerland. This is mostly due to the restricted access to these subterranean habitats. Better knowledge on these organisms is needed, because they contribute substantially to overall biodiver...

Five new species are described, Plusiocampa (Didymocampa) cvijici Sendra & Antić, sp. nov., Plusiocampa (Plusiocampa) atom Sendra & Antić, sp. nov., Plusiocampa (Stygiocampa) barethae Sendra & Rađa, sp. nov., Plusiocampa (Stygiocampa) dulcici Sendra & Rađa, sp. nov. and Plusiocampa (Venetocampa) pirnati Sendra & Borko, sp. nov. This brings the numb...

Subterranean amphipods, morphologically resembling Niphargus stygius species complex, were molecularly analysed. We isolated genomic DNA and amplified the subunit I of mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase gene (COI) for 94 specimens from 37 localities. We report on six new localities for N. chagankae, one for N. cvajcki, eight for N. gottscheeanensis,...

Eine Pilotstudie der Eawag hat an über 300 Standorten im Schweizer Mittelland die Grundwasserfauna untersucht, wobei die Rohwässer in Brunnenstuben durch die Wasserversorgungen selbst beprobt wurden. Anschliessend wurden die gefundenen Organismen morphologisch und teils genetisch bestimmt. An über 60% der Stellen wurden Organismen aus 18 biologisch...

Aim Freshwater subterranean amphipods with low dispersal abilities are known from both sides of the impermeable barrier, the Adriatic Sea. We tested the hypothesis that historical marine regression–transgression cycles shaped the distribution patterns of subterranean amphipods through repeated cycles of dispersal and vicariance against the hypothes...

Diplura is a group of entognathous hexapods, often considered a sister group to insects. They play an important role in recycling organic matter in soil and subterranean terrestrial ecosystems. The Campodeidae is the most diverse family, divided into four subfamilies. The subfamily Plusiocampinae has a subterranean life-style with many species dist...

Terrestrial life typically does not occur at depths greater than a few meters. Notable exceptions are massifs of fissured rock with caves and hollow spaces reaching depths of two kilometres and more. Recent biological discoveries from extremely deep caves have been reported as sensations analogous to wondrous deep sea creatures. However, the existe...

We characterized taxonomically, ecologically, and phylogenetically the amphipod community of Melissotrypa Cave (Central Greece), which comprises both freshwater and sulphidic lakes. We found four amphipod species: Niphargus jovanovici, Niphargus lindbergi, Niphargus gammariformis sp. nov. and an unknown species of Bogidiella. The three Niphargus sp...

Amphipods are one of the most taxonomically and ecologically diverse crustaceans, playing key roles in all aquatic ecosystems. However, they are also among the least known malacostracans, with an estimated two thirds of undiscovered species. Furthermore, widespread homoplasy has hindered their long-disputed phyletic classification and only recently...

The ecological radiation of amphipods is striking among crustaceans. Despite high diversity, global distribution and key roles in all aquatic environments, little is known about their ecological transitions, evolutionary timescale and phylogenetic relationships. It has been proposed that the amphipod ecological diversification began in the Late Pal...

The amphipod genus Niphargus (Amphipoda: Niphargidae Bousfield, 1977) is the most species-rich genus of freshwater amphipods in the World. Species of this genus, which live almost exclusively in subterranean water, offer an interesting model system for basic and applied biodiversity science. Their use, however, is often limited due to the hitherto...

Table S2. List of samples used in a detailed network analyses along with GenBank Accessions

Morphological database in DELTA

Table S1. List of samples used in phylogenetic analyses along with GenBank Accessions

Table S3. List of new records of Niphargus from Switzerland