Teaching

UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS UNDER-GRADUATE PROGRAM (revised in 2017)

In the Department of Ecology and Systematics where I am appointed as an Associate Professor, I participate in the teaching of the following under-graduate courses:

GENERAL ECOLOGY (OLD PROGRAM)

It is a compulsory course for the students of the 4th semester. The topics addressed in the course are the following:

  1. - Ecology and its objectives.

  2. - Fundamental concepts and principles of ecology.

  3. - Ecosystems, flow of energy and biochemical cycles.

  4. - Community ecology.

  5. - Biodiversity.

  6. - Terrestrial ecosystems.

  7. - Conservation and management of terrestrial ecosystems.

  8. - Aquatic ecosystems.

  9. - Biogeography.

  10. - Environmental biotechnology.

The students have also to attend 12 (3h) laboratory courses with the majority of them taking place in the field.

POPULATION ECOLOGY (OLD PROGRAM)

It is a compulsory course for the students of the 5th semester. The course is organized to address the following topics:

  1. - Population organization and structure.

  2. - Population growth.

  3. - Interactions of populations.

  4. - Regulation of populations.

  5. - Evolution of populations.

  6. - Human populations.

The students have also to attend eight (3h) laboratory courses with the majority of them taking place in the field.

ECOLOGY (REVISED PROGRAM)

It is a compulsory course for the students of the 4th semester. The course is organized to address the following topics:

  1. - Introduction to Ecology

  2. - The evolutionary basis of Ecology

  3. - Life and the physical environment

  4. - Energy in the Ecosystems

  5. - Biogeochemical cycles

  6. - Communities organization in time and space – succession

  7. - Biomes

  8. - Principles of Biogeography Populations: Growth, Interactions

  9. - Evolutionary Ecology

  10. - Principles of Conservation Ecology

  11. - Applied Ecology

The students have also to attend 10 (3h) laboratory courses with most of them taking place in the field.

TERRESTRIAL ECOSYSTEMS OF GREECE (OLD and REVISED PROGRAM).

It is an elective course for the students of the 6th semester. The course is divided into the following sections:

  1. - Evolution of the Greek landscape in the geological time.

  2. - Climatology and geology of Greece.

  3. - Habitat types of Greece.

  4. - The diversity of the terrestrial flora of Greece.

  5. - The terrestrial environment of Greece in time and space.

  6. - The diversity of the terrestrial ecosystems of Greece.

  7. - Mountainous forests.

  8. - Alpine ecosystems.

  9. - Ecotones and coastal ecosystems.

  10. - Special issues of conservation and management.

The students have also to attend 10 (3h) laboratory courses with all of them taking place during a field excursion in mountainous areas of the Peloponnese peninsula.

EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY (OLD and REVISED PROGRAM).

It is a compulsory course for the students of the 5th semester. The course is divided in the following sections:

1.- Origins of Evolutionary Biology and the trail of evolutionary thinking

2.- From Big Bang to First Cells

3.- The fundamental level of organism determination

4.- Time and life forms

5.- Evolutionary mechanisms

The goals of the course are:

1. To provide a core and advanced course introducing students to the principles of Evolutionary Biology. 2. To prepare students for an integrated knowledge and appreciation of Biology in general. 3. To show how all various life forms interweave with each other in a well organised, hierarchical web of life. 4. To outline the evolutionary relationships and their underlying selective mechanisms on a molecular, biochemical and genetic level. 5. To investigate the dynamic nature of living systems and the change of their form and function through geological time.

UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS POST-GRADUATE PROGRAMS

Ecology and Conservation of Biodiversity Postgraduate Program

I am a member of the coordinating committee of this post-graduate program that was run for the first time during the academic year 2017-2018. In this program, I serve as the coordinator of five courses (Analysis of genetic and genomic data, Statistics and ecological modeling, Molecular ecology, Evolutionary ecology, Introduction in R and Python).

The post-graduate program is designed to promote the knowledge and research in cutting-edge topics currently implemented in the broader field of Ecology. Emphasis is given to the terrestrial ecosystems, the conservation of biodiversity and other ecological applications. The program aims to generate highly trained scientists, educated in the current scientific and technological trends, equipped with skills which will enable them to apply modern research approaches on critical environmental issues related to the ecology and biodiversity conservation of terrestrial ecosystems (inland waters included).

Bioinformatics Postgraduate Program

I also participate as a tutor in the "Bioinformatics Postgraduate Program", that is run by the Faculty of Biology of the University of Athens.

The postgraduate program is designed in accordance with both the current demands and the future prospects of Bioinformatics. The postgraduate program is comprised of 11 compulsory and five elective courses and has a duration of four semesters. Each course consists of at least three hours of lecture and/or laboratory practice per week, for a period of twelve weeks. Attendance is compulsory. A research project is carried out in the third semester, with a minimum of 12 hours per week in the laboratory.

I am involved in the teaching (3 hours) of the course "Applications of informatics in the study and preservation of biodiversity" that is a compulsory course for the postgraduate students of the 1st semester.