Mauro Galetti
I was born and raised in Brazil, where I earned my bachelor and master degree at the Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). I received my PhD from Cambridge University, England where I studied the impact of palm harvesting (the palm heart or palmito, Euterpe edulis) on fruit-eating birds in the Atlantic forest. This palm is a dominant species and it is considered a keystone species for the frugivore community in the Atlantic forest. Nowadays, the populations of palm hearts can be found only in Protected Areas and they are highly threatened by illegal harvesting. The results of this research not only point out the major drivers of palm harvesting but also suggest alternatives to control this problem. The major results of this research were published in Biological Conservation and Journal of Applied Ecology.
After finishing my PhD, I started a post doctorate in Kalimantan, Indonesia where I studied seed dispersal by hornbills and sun bears in a Dipterocarp forest. Most of Bornean rainforests are subject to logging and there are few areas where one can study natural regeneration process. Unfortunately due to the civil war, I had to evacuate from the field site and then return to Brazil.
Since 1998, I am a professor at the Departamento de Ecologia at UNESP Rio Claro where I have published more than 150 papers in peer review journals in Portuguese, Spanish and English.
I was a visiting scientist at Integrative Ecology Group at Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC) in Seville, Spain and Tinker Visiting Professor at the Center for Latin American Studies at Stanford University.
Since Jan. 2011 I became the Latin American Editor of Biological Conservation.
My research interest is to understand the complex interactions between fruit-eating animals (frugivores) and plants and how human impact, including forest fragmentation, exotic species, climate change and poaching, affects on ecosystem services and biodiversity structure.
Address: Departamento de Ecologia
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP)
CP 199
13506-900 Rio Claro, São Paulo
Brazil
After finishing my PhD, I started a post doctorate in Kalimantan, Indonesia where I studied seed dispersal by hornbills and sun bears in a Dipterocarp forest. Most of Bornean rainforests are subject to logging and there are few areas where one can study natural regeneration process. Unfortunately due to the civil war, I had to evacuate from the field site and then return to Brazil.
Since 1998, I am a professor at the Departamento de Ecologia at UNESP Rio Claro where I have published more than 150 papers in peer review journals in Portuguese, Spanish and English.
I was a visiting scientist at Integrative Ecology Group at Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC) in Seville, Spain and Tinker Visiting Professor at the Center for Latin American Studies at Stanford University.
Since Jan. 2011 I became the Latin American Editor of Biological Conservation.
My research interest is to understand the complex interactions between fruit-eating animals (frugivores) and plants and how human impact, including forest fragmentation, exotic species, climate change and poaching, affects on ecosystem services and biodiversity structure.
Address: Departamento de Ecologia
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP)
CP 199
13506-900 Rio Claro, São Paulo
Brazil
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Papers by Mauro Galetti
Some neotropical, fleshy-fruited plants have fruits structurally similar to paleotropical fruits dispersed by megafauna (mammals >103 kg), yet these dispersers were extinct in South America 10–15 Kyr BP. Anachronic dispersal systems are best explained by interactions with extinct animals and show impaired dispersal resulting in altered seed dispersal dynamics.
Methodology/Principal Findings
We introduce an operational definition of megafaunal fruits and perform a comparative analysis of 103 Neotropical fruit species fitting this dispersal mode. We define two megafaunal fruit types based on previous analyses of elephant fruits: fruits 4–10 cm in diameter with up to five large seeds, and fruits >10 cm diameter with numerous small seeds. Megafaunal fruits are well represented in unrelated families such as Sapotaceae, Fabaceae, Solanaceae, Apocynaceae, Malvaceae, Caryocaraceae, and Arecaceae and combine an overbuilt design (large fruit mass and size) with either a single or few (<3 seeds) extremely large seeds or many small seeds (usually >100 seeds). Within-family and within-genus contrasts between megafaunal and non-megafaunal groups of species indicate a marked difference in fruit diameter and fruit mass but less so for individual seed mass, with a significant trend for megafaunal fruits to have larger seeds and seediness.
Conclusions/Significance
Megafaunal fruits allow plants to circumvent the trade-off between seed size and dispersal by relying on frugivores able to disperse enormous seed loads over long-distances. Present-day seed dispersal by scatter-hoarding rodents, introduced livestock, runoff, flooding, gravity, and human-mediated dispersal allowed survival of megafauna-dependent fruit species after extinction of the major seed dispersers. Megafauna extinction had several potential consequences, such as a scale shift reducing the seed dispersal distances, increasingly clumped spatial patterns, reduced geographic ranges and limited genetic variation and increased among-population structuring. These effects could be extended to other plant species dispersed by large vertebrates in present-day, defaunated communities.
Some neotropical, fleshy-fruited plants have fruits structurally similar to paleotropical fruits dispersed by megafauna (mammals >103 kg), yet these dispersers were extinct in South America 10–15 Kyr BP. Anachronic dispersal systems are best explained by interactions with extinct animals and show impaired dispersal resulting in altered seed dispersal dynamics.
Methodology/Principal Findings
We introduce an operational definition of megafaunal fruits and perform a comparative analysis of 103 Neotropical fruit species fitting this dispersal mode. We define two megafaunal fruit types based on previous analyses of elephant fruits: fruits 4–10 cm in diameter with up to five large seeds, and fruits >10 cm diameter with numerous small seeds. Megafaunal fruits are well represented in unrelated families such as Sapotaceae, Fabaceae, Solanaceae, Apocynaceae, Malvaceae, Caryocaraceae, and Arecaceae and combine an overbuilt design (large fruit mass and size) with either a single or few (<3 seeds) extremely large seeds or many small seeds (usually >100 seeds). Within-family and within-genus contrasts between megafaunal and non-megafaunal groups of species indicate a marked difference in fruit diameter and fruit mass but less so for individual seed mass, with a significant trend for megafaunal fruits to have larger seeds and seediness.
Conclusions/Significance
Megafaunal fruits allow plants to circumvent the trade-off between seed size and dispersal by relying on frugivores able to disperse enormous seed loads over long-distances. Present-day seed dispersal by scatter-hoarding rodents, introduced livestock, runoff, flooding, gravity, and human-mediated dispersal allowed survival of megafauna-dependent fruit species after extinction of the major seed dispersers. Megafauna extinction had several potential consequences, such as a scale shift reducing the seed dispersal distances, increasingly clumped spatial patterns, reduced geographic ranges and limited genetic variation and increased among-population structuring. These effects could be extended to other plant species dispersed by large vertebrates in present-day, defaunated communities.