Pavel Hulva

Pavel Hulva was a Czech zoologist, evolutionary geneticist, and university teacher whose work linked DNA from wolves, bears, bats, and whales to the practical politics of living with large mammals in Central Europe. Born on 22 November 1975 in Cesky Tesin, then Czechoslovakia, he died unexpectedly on 1 November 2026 at the age of 50. Colleagues at Charles University's Faculty of Science and at the University of Ostrava remembered him as a central figure in contemporary Czech vertebrate biology and conservation genetics.

Hulva grew up in the Tesin region on the Czech-Polish border, with childhood ties to the nearby Carpathian foothills that later shaped his fieldwork. After Gymnazium Cesky Tesin (1990-1994), he studied molecular biology at Charles University's Faculty of Science in Prague (1994-2000), then completed a Ph.D. in zoology there (2000-2006) and the RNDr. doctorate in 2007. He stayed on the Department of Zoology, moved in 2012 to the Department of Biology and Ecology at the University of Ostrava while remaining closely tied to Prague teaching and research, habilitated in 2013, and was appointed professor of zoology in 2024.

His research group worked across evolutionary genetics, molecular ecology, phylogeography, and conservation biogeography of mobile mammals, especially bats, carnivores, ungulates, and cetaceans within the Laurasiatheria lineage. Internationally he was known for genetic studies of the returning Central European wolf, Carpathian and Slovak brown bears, hedgehog contact zones, fruit bats, and southern right whales, including citizen-science blow sampling. Faculty tributes cited more than 250 publications, roughly 95 higher-impact papers (about 35 as lead author), venues including Nature and PNAS, and more than 3,000 citations.

In Czech public life he became a calm scientific voice on the return of wolves. In UK Forum he argued that fear of wolves is largely an evolutionary atavism, that livestock make up only a small share of wolf diet in Czech conditions, and that rewilding needs cores, corridors, and carnivores. In an Aktuálně.cz interview tied to the documentary Vlci na hranicích he insisted that nature is not a Disney fairy tale, that benefits of wolves for ecosystems outweigh damages, and that rifle selection cannot replace natural selection. Students repeatedly named his Evolution of Vertebrates course among the most memorable lectures in biological study.

He lived in Stoky in the Vysocina region, had two children, Zuzana and Patrik, and outside the lab practised diving and membership in Czech angling and hunting associations. Platforms searched for personal social accounts (X, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok) did not yield verified personal profiles; public memory after his death circulated mainly through university notices, Czech news, recorded lectures, and tributes from colleagues such as journalist Ondrej Vrtiska. Colleagues described a thinker of wide range who opened new Czech research lines on large mammals and cetology, published widely, and practised a live-and-let-live ethic of discussion and mutual respect.

Hulva framed mammal research inside Laurasiatheria, treating bats, carnivores, ungulates and whales as one comparative branch rather than isolated case studies. Papers from his circle traced glacial refugia and contact zones in hedgehogs, phylogeography of bent-wing and horseshoe bats, endogenous deltaretroviruses in bat genomes, and the genomic make-up of Czechoslovakian Wolfdogs. On land he helped interpret photo-trap, scat and tissue evidence that by 2019-2020 documented on the order of twenty Czech wolf territories, many shared across borders. At sea he joined teams sampling southern right whales from Brazil to South Georgia, including citizen-science blow collections that turn fleeting whale breaths into DNA.

Teaching and outreach mattered as much as the citation counts. Recorded Biologické čtvrtky evenings in Prague captured long lectures and discussions on Anthropocene bears, island biogeography of societies, and the hybrid speciation story behind Little Red Riding Hood. A Masaryk University talk on Slovak bears extended the same style to Brno audiences. Journalism in Vesmír, UK Forum and Aktuálně.cz translated population genetics into arguments about compensation for shepherds, eco-ducts for spring dispersal, and why fairy-tale cruelty is a poor guide to ecology. After 1 November 2026 those recordings and essays became the public archive of a scientist who tried to keep Czech debate about large mammals tethered to evidence.