Hello, my name is Rafael Pinheiro. I am currently a Invited Guest Resarcher (Fapesp Young Researcher) at the State University of Campinas (Unicamp).
I have a Ph.D. in Ecology, Conservation and Wildlife Management, by the Federal University of Minas Gerais. During my Ph.D. I was a member of the Ecological Synthesis Lab, and a guest Ph.D. for one year in the Department of Biometry and Environmental System Analysis, University of Freiburg, Germany. Between 2021 and 2024 I worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Campinas. Also, for a year (sep 2022-aug 2023), I was a guest researcher in the Spatial Interaction Ecology group at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) in Leipzig, Germany.
My main research interest is the ecology and evolution of species interactions, both mutualiasms and antagonisms. Since my undergraduation I have been studying the interaction between mistletoes (Struthanthus flexicaulis) and host trees, as well as its effects on the plant communities of Cangas (ferruginous rupestrian fields). Published results from these researches can be found here and here.
Since my Masters’ Degree, I have studied the interactions between parasites and hosts in avian malaria systems. My studies have been focused on the diversity, specialization and geographical distribution of the avian malaria parasites, as well as in the structure of the networks formed by those interactions (examples here, here, and here). As a result of my Master’s Degree research, we published a paper in which we proposed a new hypothesis for the specialization of parasites: the integrative hypothesis of parasite specialization.
My Ph.D. thesis was focused on ecological network topologies and its underlying mechanisms. In my Ph.D research, I used the integrative hypothesis of specialization to derive a mechanism able to shape interaction networks into the most common topologies. The second chapter of my thesis was aimed at explaining the emergence of nestedness in ecological networks. I hope it will be published soon as a paper, but in the meanwhile, you can read a pre-print.
As a postdoc in Unicamp (2021-2024), I first focused on developing the conceptual and methodological framework of hierarchical compound topologies. My two main publications on the theme so far are Pinheiro et al. 2022 and Felix et al. 2022.
As a postdoc in the Federal University of Goiás (2025) I studied some of the environmental and biological consequences of the collapse of the Fundão Dam in Mariana, MG. Check this synthesis on the spread of tailing plumes along the Brazilian coast: Pinheiro et al. 2026.
I have teach “Ecological Networks” and “Fundaments of Biodiversity” in the Graduate Program of Ecology in the University of Campinas. I am on Twitter and Research Gate (although I rarely access them nowadays). For codes, check my GitHub. I am also a co-author of bipartite R package (CRAN and GitHub).
Rafael Pinheiro 