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Abstract: Understanding how organisms adapt to complex environments is a central goal of evolutionary biology and ecology. This issue is of special interest in the current era of rapidly changing climatic conditions. Here, we investigate clinal variation and plastic responses in life history, morphology, and physiology in the butterfly Pieris napi along a pan-European gradient by exposing butterflies raised in captivity to different temperatures. We found clinal variation in body size, growth rates and concomitant development time, wing aspect ratio, wing melanisation, and heat tolerance. Individuals from warmer environments were more heat-tolerant, had less melanised wings and a shorter development but still they were larger than individuals from cooler environments. These findings suggest selection for rapid growth in the warmth and for wing melanisation in the cold, and thus fine-tuned genetic adaptation to local climates. Irrespective of the origin of butterflies, the effects of higher developmental temperature were largely as expected, speeding up development, reducing body size, potential metabolic activity, and wing melanisation, while increasing heat tolerance. At least in part, these patterns likely reflect adaptive phenotypic plasticity. In summary, our study revealed pronounced plastic and genetic responses, which may indicate high adaptive capacities in our study organism. Whether this may help such species though to deal with current climate change needs further investigation, as clinal patterns have typically evolved over long periods.
Keywords: butterflies, morphology, physiology, genetics, climate change, data
Published in DiRROS: 27.10.2025; Views: 194; Downloads: 111
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Abstract: Organisms face numerous environmental stressors, which can affect developmental precision. Developmental instability can be used as an efficient and reliable bioindicator of environmental stressors and individual health. However, little information is available about effects of interspecific interactions on occurrence of developmental instability. We analyzed fluctuating asymmetry in two sympatric lizard species (Iberolacerta horvathi and Podarcis muralis), which exhibit a competitive interaction, to determine potential effects of altitude, interspecific competition and urbanization on a set of physical characteristics. We sampled 16 syntopic and allotopic populations and used methods of geometric morphometrics to analyze head morphology. We detected significant effect of altitude, but the trend was not linear: lizards had most asymmetrical heads at mid altitudes, which could be related to lower availability of favorable lizard habitats (open areas) at this altitude and therefore higher competition. We observed that lizards from allotopic populations attained larger head sizes compared to lizards in syntopy that experienced interspecific competition. This could suggest that in sites where competing species is absent, individuals can invest more energy in the development of the body. Moreover, head shape of Iberolacerta horvathi was more asymmetric compared to Podarcis muralis, which could indicate difference between species in the vulnerability to stress effects. We did not detect any statistically significant effect of urbanization, which could relate to relatively low degree of pollution and habitat degradation in our study area. Our results highlight the possibility of using lizards and developmental instability for bioindication of environmental stressors.
Keywords: lizards, morphology, ecology, asymmetries, data
Published in DiRROS: 27.10.2025; Views: 149; Downloads: 98
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Abstract: 1. We examined intra- and interspecific variation in functional morphology and whole-organism performance in a sympatric lizard species pair, Iberolacerta horvathi and Podarcis muralis, in the area with a high potential for competition. 2. The biggest variation between species was found in two functional traits, bite force and climbing speed, linked with corresponding morphological traits. 3. The species with larger and taller heads, P. muralis, exhibited correspondingly stronger bite forces. The other species exhibited smaller and flatter head. Both traits may potentially promote segregation between species in trophic niche (stronger bites relate to harder prey) and in refuge use (flatter heads allow using narrower crevices, hence, influencing escaping from common predators). Stronger bites and larger heads also provide one species with a dominant position in interspecific agonistic interactions. 4. Females had longer trunks that impacted negatively on climbing speed, which may lower anti-predator escape abilities of the more trunk-dimorphic species, but positively influence reproductive effort. 5. Our results exemplify how the joint examination of morphological and functional traits of ecologically similar and sympatric species can provide a mechanistic background for understanding their coexistence, namely syntopic populations that are frequent in the study area. 6. The identified roles of functional morphology in this system of sympatric rock lizards support the contribution of functional diversification for the complexity of community structure via coexistence.
Keywords: lizards, morphology, ecology, data
Published in DiRROS: 24.10.2025; Views: 239; Downloads: 123
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Abstract: Publikacija predstavlja historične in umetnostnozgodovinske poudarke izbranih dvorcev in vil v zahodni Sloveniji, pri čemer se ne posveča zgolj najpomembnejšim arhitekturnim poudarkom, ampak poskuša zgodovino stavb in njihovih posameznikov razložiti v zgodovinskem kontekstu, v katerem so živeli. Izpostavlja posameznike, ki so s svojimi življenjskimi zgodbami in karierami pustili poseben pečat v svojem času, ustvarili zavidljive knjižne in umetniške zbirke in na svojih dvorcih gostili pomembne osebnosti. Gre namreč za okolje, ki je zaradi političnih sprememb na začetku 16. stoletja omogočilo predstavnikom številnih plemiških rodbin (Cobenzl, Lanthieri, Hofer, Rabatta, Thurn, Thurn-Valsassina, Herberstein, Edling, Dornberk, Coronini) hiter vzpon znotraj plemiške hierarhije zaradi diplomatskih in dvornih služb, od uspešnih diplomatov na cesarskem dvoru do spretnih rodbinskih in kariernih povezav, mnogi pa so svoj prestiž in ugled izkazovali tudi skozi podobe dvorcev, ki so predstavljeni v publikaciji. Ob izumrtju nekaj najpomembnejših novoveških rodbin so lastniki nekaterih dvorcev postali meščani in prav ti so spisali prav neverjetne znanstvene in karitativne zgodbe. Publikacija pomeni pregled obsežne obstoječe literature, pri določenih lokacijah (Žablje, Kozlov rob, Coronini, Lože, Rihemberk, dvorec Ravne pri Pivki, Šilentabor) pa so bile opravljene tudi nove raziskave.
Keywords: umetnostna zgodovina, plemiške rodbine
Published in DiRROS: 24.10.2025; Views: 211; Downloads: 157
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Published in DiRROS: 24.10.2025; Views: 142; Downloads: 56
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