Obituary: Nelio Roberto dos Reis (1950-2023)

Dr. Nelio Roberto dos Reis (Fig. 1), a Brazilian Professor of Mammalogy at the Universidade Estadual de Londrina, passed away on December 2, 2023, at the age of 73, in Londrina, Paraná, as the result of complications from a heart surgery. He is survived by his wife, three adult children, and seven grandchildren.

Nelio, as he was affectionately called by his many friends and colleagues, was born in Londrina (PR) on September 26, 1950. He graduated in Biomedical Sciences from the Universidade Estadual de Londrina (State University of Londrina - UEL; 1971-1975). In 1976, he moved with his family to Manaus (AM) to pursue a MS in the new Graduate Program in Ecology of the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia (National Institute of Amazonian Research - INPA; 1976-1978). His thesis, under Dr. Way Yin Mok and Dr. Herbert Otto Roger Schubart, was entitled “Morcegos da região de Manaus e suas relações com fungos patogênicos” (Bats from Manaus and their relationships with pathogenic fungi). In this work, the fungus Wangiella dermatitidis was firstly detected in bats, a significant discovery in his field.

After completing his MS, Nelio started his PhD (1978-1981) at the same school, under Dr. Adriano Lúcio Peracchi (from Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro), who became a close friend and collaborator, and with whom he published dozens of articles and books. Nelio finished his dissertation “Estudos ecológicos dos quirópteros de matas primárias e capoeiras da região de Manaus, Amazonas” (Ecological studies of chiropterans from primary forests and capoeiras in the region of Manaus, Amazonas) in 1981, making him the first student to receive a PhD from the Program in Ecology at INPA.

Prof. Nelio was employed by Universidade Estadual de Londrina on April 1, 1978, as a Specialist Professor before completing his MS. When he returned to his post after a leave of absence to pursue his graduate studies at INPA, and following a public selection process, he became Full Professor of the Department of Animal and Plant Biology (UEL, Ecology Area and Animal Ecology Subarea), where he remained until his retirement on March 20, 2012.

Nelio’s first published article was a preliminary information note on bats from the middle Tapajos River, followed by publications on the bats of Maraca Island (Roraima) and Manaus. His MS thesis and PhD dissertation and publications throughout the 1980s, on the bats of the Amazon region, are considered seminal by his peers and have influenced generations of young researchers to study the Amazon biome. From 1990 on, Dr. Nelio devoted attention to the bat fauna of Londrina.

Dr. Nelio was invited to participate in the Tibagi Project, which includes multiple subprojects from various areas and departments at UEL, working with a consortium of municipalities in the Tibagi River basin along with the company Klabin S/A. In this project, he and his students joined an ecology subproject, surveying and collecting ecological data on bats of the upper, middle, and lower Tibagi River, with a primary focus on the Klabin Ecological Park (PEK), at Monte Alegre Farm, in Telemaco Borba, Paraná. Based on the results of this project, Dr. Nelio authored and co-authored books, papers, theses, and dissertations. One of Professor Nelio’s first initiatives was to create a list and an identification key for bats from Mata dos Godoy State Park, one of the last remnants of semideciduous seasonal forests in Paraná.

As part of an academic exchange with Antioch College (Yellow Springs, Ohio, USA), Dr. Nelio advised one American student (Deidra Astrea Taylor) who participated in fieldwork and other activities in the Projeto Tibagi during her stay at UEL. During this time, Prof. Nelio also contributed to public health, publishing a bulletin on bats and rabies, distributed by the Municipal Health Department of Londrina.

In 2002, the Tibagi Project culminated in the book Bacia do Rio Tibagi (Tibagi River Basin), in which Dr. Nelio contributed with two chapters: Morcegos da Bacia do Rio Tibagi (Bats from the Tibagi River Basin) and Mamíferos não voadores da Bacia do Rio Tibagi (Non-flying mammals of the Tibagi River Basin). Subsequently, in 2004, a new partnership with the company Klabin S/A resulted in data that supported the publication of the book “Mamíferos da Fazenda Monte Alegre, Paraná” (Mammals from the Monte Alegre Farm, Paraná) in 2005, involving the participation of various researchers and undergraduate and graduate students.

In 2006, in Gramado (RS), during the “I South American Congress of Mammalogy”, he launched the first edition of the book Mamíferos do Brasil (Mammals of Brazil; Fig. 1) and participated in the founding assembly of Sociedade Brasileira para o Estudo de Quirópteros (Brazilian Bat Research Society; SBEQ), where he served as a consultant during three terms until 2013. In 2010, at the 5^th SBEQ meeting (Búzios, RJ), Nelio had the opportunity to present an honorary membership certificate to his advisor and friend, Dr. Adriano Lúcio Peracchi (Fig. 2).

Figures 1-3
(1) Autograph session for the book Mamíferos do Brasil. Photo: Isaac P. Lima; (2) Honorary member ceremony guided by Nelio to his advisor, Dr. Adriano Lúcio Peracchi (on the right), during the V EBEQ. Photo: SBEQ collection; (3) Professor Nelio Roberto dos Reis receiving the Taddei Award during the 8^th EBEQ, Ouro Preto, MG. Photo: Augusto Gomes - SBEQ collection.

From 2000 until his retirement in March 20, 2012, Dr. Nelio was the most productive, publishing 25 articles in national and international journals and nine books. Among the books he organized, noteworthy are Mamíferos do Brasil (Mammals of Brazil, 2006 and 2011 - 1^st and 2^nd editions), Morcegos do Brasil (Brazilian Bats, 2007), História natural dos morcegos brasileiros e chave de identificação de Espécies (Natural history of Brazilian bats and species identification key, 2017), in which he collaborated with dozens of researchers from various institutions. Concerned about the identification process in the field, Nelio also organized and published books such as Técnicas de estudos aplicadas aos mamíferos silvestres brasileiros (Study techniques applied to Brazilian wild mammals, 2010 and 2014, 1^st and 2^nd editions), and identification the guides Guia ilustrado dos Mamíferos do Paraná (Illustrated Guide of Mammals from Paraná, 2009), Mamíferos do Brasil: guia de identificação (Mammals of Brazil: identification guide, 2010), Morcegos do Brasil: guia de campo (Bats of Brazil: field guide, 2013), and Mamíferos terrestres de médio e grande porte da Mata Atlântica: guia de campo (Medium and large terrestrial mammals of the Atlantic Forest: field guide, 2014).

In 2015, Dr. Nelio received the Taddei Award at the 8^th Brazilian Bat Meeting (EBEQ) in Ouro Preto (MG), for his contributions to science, teaching, and scientific dissemination (Fig. 3).

His dedication extended beyond science, as he wrote chronicles about local social issues and political opinion texts, including two books: “Sensibilidade do Dinossauro” (Dinosaur Sensitivity; 2011) and “Anjo Agnóstico” (Agnostic Angel; 2023), in addition to dozens of texts for the Folha de Londrina newspaper and the Maquinações magazine (EDUEL).

Throughout his academic career, Prof. Nelio supervised 26 students, including 24 MS theses, five PhD dissertations, one post-doctoral supervision (Table 1), three specializations and 15 undergraduates. He authored 42 peer-reviewed articles, and 14 books on ecology and natural history of mammals.

Table 1
List of graduate students and post-doc supervised by Professor Nelio throughout his academic career.

Graduate students and post-doc	Degrees obtained
an Deivid Pereira	MS
Bruna Karla Rossaneis	MS
Carolina Blefari Batista	MS
Carolina Carvalho Cheida	MS
Cibele Maria Vianna Zanon	MS, PhD
Eduardo Ribeiro Sartore	MS
Fábio Nascimento Oliveira Fogaça	MS
Fábio Rodrigo Andrade	MS
Gabriela Regina de Oliveira	MS
Gisele Aparecida da Silva Doratti dos Santos	MS
Gisele da Silva Porto	MS
Guilherme Silveira	MS
Guilherme Zamarian Rezende	MS
Henrique Ortêncio Filho	PhD
Inaê Guion de Almeida	MS
Isaac Passos de Lima	MS
Lívia Bertolla Santos	MS
Maíra Nunes Fregonezi	MS
Márcio Cisterna Motta	MS
Margareth Lumy Sekiama	MS, PhD
Patrícia Helena Gallo Ramos	MS, PhD
Reginaldo Leal Blanc	MS
Renata Issa Rickli	MS
Vivien Rissato Santos	MS
Vlamir José Rocha	MS, PhD
Wagner André Pedro	Postdoc

LITERATURE CITED

• Medri ME, Bianchini E, Shibatta OA, Pimenta JA (Eds) (2002) A Bacia do Rio Tibagi. Universidade de Londrina, Londrina, 595 pp.
• Peracchi AL, Fregonezi MN, Rossaneis BK, Reis NR, Shibatta OA, Sartore ER, Ferracioli P, Santos VR (2014) Mamíferos terrestres de médio e grande porte da Mata Atlântica: guia de campo. Technical Books Editora, Rio de Janeiro, 146 pp.
• Peracchi AL, Rocha VJ, Reis NR (2002) Mamíferos não-voadores da bacia do rio Tibagi. In: Medri ME, Bianchini E, Shibatta OA, Pimenta JA (Eds) A Bacia do Rio Tibagi. 225-249. Universidade de Londrina, Londrina, 595 pp.
• Reis NR (1978) Morcegos da região de Manaus e suas relações com fungos patogênicos. MS Thesis, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Manaus, Brasil.
• Reis NR (1981) Estudos ecológicos dos quirópteros de matas primárias e capoeiras da região de Manaus, Amazônas. PhD Thesis, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Manaus, Brasil.
• Reis NR (2005) Mamíferos da Fazenda Monte Alegre. Editora da Universidae Estadual de Londrina, Londrina, vol. 1, 200 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Fregonezi MN, Rossaneis BK (2010) Mamíferos do Brasil: guia de identificação. Technical Books Editora, Rio de Janeiro, 558 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Fregonezi MN, Shibatta OA (2013) Morcegos do Brasil: guia de campo. Technical Books Editora, Rio de Janeiro, 252 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Lima IP (2002) Morcegos da Bacia do Rio Tibagi. In: Medri ME, Bianchini E, Shibatta OA, Pimenta JA (Eds) A Bacia do Rio Tibagi. 251-270. Universidade de Londrina, Londrina, 595 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Pedro VA, Lima IP (2006) Mamíferos do Brasil. Londrina, 1^nd ed., 437 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Pedro VA, Lima IP (2007) Morcegos do Brasil. Londrina, 253 pp.
• Reis NR, Peracchi AL, Pedro VA, Lima IP (2011) Mamíferos do Brasil. Londrina, 2^nd ed., 439 pp.

ADDITIONAL NOTES

• How to cite this article

  Peracchi AL, Pereira AD, Batista CB, Cheida CC, Lima IP, Sekiama ML, Rocha VJ, Pedro WA (2024) Obituary: Nelio Roberto dos Reis (1950-2023). Zoologia 41: e24013. https://doi.org/10.1590/S1984-4689.v41.e24013

• Published by

  Sociedade Brasileira de Zoologia at Scientific Electronic Library Online (https://www.scielo.br/zool)

Edited by

Editorial responsibility

Ricardo Moratelli

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  10 May 2024
• Date of issue
  2024

History

• Received
  15 Feb 2024
• Accepted
  08 Mar 2024