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Fabio Alfieri

@fabioalfieri2.bsky.social
100 followers 84 following 14 posts

Evolutionary biologist and functional morphologist focusing on the evolution of bone morphology in vertebrates. Post-doc at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Delighted to share that from August 2026 I'm joining the @amgc-vub.bsky.social at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) as a postdoctoral researcher within the ERC Advanced project PLIODIS (pliodis.github.io). Looking forward to exploring South African Plio-Pleistocene hominin evolution.
pliodis.github.io
PLIODIS
Understanding hominin dispersal to southern Africa during the Plio–Pleistocene.
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
It has been an honour and a great experience attending the wonderful Society for Experimental Biology 2026 meeting in Florence, contributing with a talk on fossil trabecular bone and related methods. Thanks to my collaborator @aveneziano.bsky.social and @sebiology.bsky.social
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
New paper out! 🦴🐒 In the trabecular bone of tamarin limbs, we found that beyond non-locomotor factors, leaping distance leaves a signal! Thanks to @aveneziano.bsky.social, and colleagues from the lab led by @johnnyakatura.bsky.social Open Access on American Journal of Biological Anthropology
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
It was very rewarding collaborating on a citizen science project dealing with City Nature Challenge 2025 in Turin🌿! Thanks to all the colleagues! Paper now out as Open Access on Urban Ecosystems #CitizenScience #CityNatureChallenge #UrbanEcology #Turin link.springer.com/article/10.1...
link.springer.com
⁠Institutional coordination in urban citizen science: a case study within the Italian City Nature Challenge - Urban Ecosystems
Citizen science is increasingly used to document biodiversity in urban ecosystems while simultaneously promoting public engagement with nature. However, how institutional coordination relates to parti...
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Strikingly, the largest koala-lemur emerges as a suspensory taxon. This would place it among the largest mammals known with this locomotor specialization, rivalled today only by orangutans! Stay tuned for more work on these bizarre extinct primates! commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Me... 6/6
commons.wikimedia.org
File:Megaladapis edwardsi skeleton.JPG - Wikimedia Commons
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Femoral data identify suspensory/bridging arboreal species (tree sloths, orangutans, lorises). Inferring extinct taxa's locomotion, we confirmed previously proposed sloth-lemurs' suspensory habits (Figure from Alfieri et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0), doi.org/10.1093/zool...) 5/6
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
This allowed us to assess and statistically test how this anatomical level co-varies with locomotion in extant species. (Figure from Alfieri et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0), doi.org/10.1093/zool...) 4/6
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
We then quantified humeral/femoral trabecular bone in extant mammals and extinct lemurs. For the latter, we used traditional and more recent approaches to clean fossil trabecular bone structure. (Figure from Alfieri et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0), doi.org/10.1093/zool...) 3/6
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
We first identified links between limb trabecular bone and locomotion in a broad mammalian sample. We used published quantitative behavioural data to define ad-hoc locomotor categories. (Figure from Alfieri et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0), doi.org/10.1093/zool...) 2/6
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
I’m very happy to share that our work on bone inner structure of Madagascar’s subfossil sloth- and koala-lemurs is finally out 🦴🐒 on @zoojlinnsoc.bsky.social A big thank you to co-authors @julsam.bsky.social Carla Argilés Esturgó and Damiano Marchi! academic.oup.com/zoolinnean/a... 1/6
academic.oup.com
The locomotor behaviour of subfossil Malagasy sloth-lemurs (Strepsirrhini: Indriidae) and koala-lemurs (Strepsirrhini: Megaladapidae): new insights from limb trabecular bone
Abstract. The locomotion of Malagasy Quaternary subfossil lemurs, including palaeopropithecines (‘sloth-lemurs’) and megaladapids (‘koala-lemurs’), has bee
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 22/10/2025
Very happy to share the preprint of our work on Quaternary subfossil lemur trabecular structure! Thanks to co-authors @julsam.bsky.social, Carla Argilés Esturgó and Damiano Marchi www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
biorxiv.org
The locomotor behavior of subfossil Malagasy sloth-lemurs (Strepsirrhini: Palaeopropithecidae) and koala-lemurs (Strepsirrhini: Megaladapidae): new insights from limb trabecular bone
The locomotion of Malagasy Quaternary subfossil lemurs - including palaeopropithecids (sloth-lemurs) and megaladapids (koala-lemurs) -has been investigated on abundant postcranial remains. Proposed st...
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 14/10/2025
And here you can find the plain-language summary🙂 fesummaries.wordpress.com/2025/09/19/w...
fesummaries.wordpress.com
Why bird wing bones look so similar inside, no matter how they live
Fabio Alfieri, Oliver E. Demuth, Elizabeth M. Steell, Anne-Claire Fabre, Daniel J. Field This is a plain language summary of a Functional Ecology research article which can be found here. Bones are…
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 14/10/2025
thank you so much @albertonykus.bsky.social :)
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Fabio Alfieri @fabioalfieri2.bsky.social · 14/10/2025
Happy to share my first postdoc work published in @funecology.bsky.social ! A huge thank-you to @oliverdemuth.bsky.social @lizzysteell.bsky.social @fieldpalaeo.bsky.social @grumpydrfabre.bsky.social and to @snsf.ch besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Constrained variation in the internal architecture of avian wing bones
Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
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Reposted by Fabio Alfieri
Dr Alessio Veneziano @aveneziano.bsky.social · 16/05/2025
Our latest paper on fibulas 🦴 has finally a home in the @journalofanatomy.bsky.social! We studied trabecular architecture to check if it records arboreal habits 🌳 in #primates 🐒🦧🦍... (1/2) 🧪 #science 🏺 #BioAnth dx.doi.org/10.1111/joa....
dx.doi.org
The relationship between primate distal fibula trabecular architecture and arboreality, phylogeny and size
The fibula, despite being traditionally overlooked compared to the femur and the tibia, has recently received attention in primate functional morphology due to its correlation with the degree of arbo....
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