Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Life Sciences
Barcoding Brazilian mammals to monitor biological diversity and threats: trends, perspectives, and knowledge gaps
Published: 2024-02-10
Subjects: Life Sciences
DNA barcoding and environmental DNA (eDNA) represent an important advance for biomonitoring the world's biodiversity and its threats. However, these methods are highly dependent on the presence of species sequences on molecular databases. Brazil is one of the largest and most biologically diverse countries in the world. However, many knowledge gaps still exist for the description, identification, [...]
Evolutionary perspectives on thiamine supplementation of managed Pacific salmonid populations
Published: 2024-02-10
Subjects: Life Sciences
Thiamine deficiency complex (TDC) in fishes has been identified in an ever-expanding list of species and populations. In many documented occurrences of TDC in fishes, rates of juvenile mortality have reached 90% at the population level, with many females producing no surviving offspring. Such sweeping demographic losses and concomitant decreases in genetic diversity due to TDC can be prevented by [...]
Selection versus Transmission: Quantitative and Organismic Biology in Antibiotic Resistance
Published: 2024-02-01
Subjects: Life Sciences, Medicine and Health Sciences
We aimed to determine the importance of selection (mostly dependent on the anthropogenic use of antimicrobials) and transmission (mostly dependent on hygiene and sanitation) as drivers of the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacterial populations. The first obstacle to estimating the relative weight of both independent variables is the lack of detailed quantitative data concerning the number of [...]
How bottlenecks shape adaptive potential: from theory and microbiology to conservation biology
Published: 2024-02-01
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Wild populations frequently undergo demographic changes that can destabilize their persistence and, thus, the equilibrium of ecosystems. For instance, habitat loss due to human activities leads to a drastic population size reduction, a process called a bottleneck. By reducing genetic diversity, a bottleneck may prevent a population from adapting to subsequent environmental changes. In the context [...]
The relative contribution of acoustic signals versus movement cues in group coordination and collective decision-making
Published: 2024-01-30
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
To benefit from group living, individuals need to maintain cohesion and coordinate their activities. Effective communication thus becomes critical, facilitating rapid coordination of behaviours and reducing consensus costs when group members have differing needs and information. In many bird and mammal species, collective decisions rely on acoustic signals in some contexts but on movement cues in [...]
Satellite observations reveal a positive relationship between trait-based diversity and drought response in temperate forests
Published: 2024-01-30
Subjects: Life Sciences
Mapping and predicting ecosystem responses to climate extremes is crucial in the face of global change. To what extent the behavior of non-experimental systems at large scales corresponds to the relationships discovered in biodiversity-ecosystem functioning (BEF) experiments remains unclear. We investigated the relationship between remotely-sensed trait-based diversity and drought responses in [...]
The Distraction Function of Extrafloral Nectaries: Keeping Ants Away From Flowers and Preventing Disruption of Pollination
Published: 2024-01-30
Subjects: Desert Ecology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
In exchange for extrafloral nectar, ants deter herbivores from the plants, reducing the amount of herbivory they suffered. However, this defensive mutualism can sometimes have negative effects on plants, as ants may also visit flowers, deterring pollinators and reducing plant fitness. The Distraction Hypothesis posits that extrafloral nectaries (EFNs) have the function of attracting ants and [...]
Evolutionary outcomes arising from bistability in ecosystem dynamics
Published: 2024-01-29
Subjects: Life Sciences
While it is known that shallow lakes ecosystems may experience abrupt shifts (ie tipping points) from one state to a contrasting degraded alternative state as a result of gradual envi- ronmental changes, the role of evolutionary processes and the impact of trait variation in this context remain largely unexplored. It is crucial to elucidate how eco-evolutionary feedbacks affect abrupt ecological [...]
Impacts of Changing Winters on Lake Ecosystems will Increase with Latitude
Published: 2024-01-29
Subjects: Life Sciences
Climate warming is especially pronounced in winter and at high latitudes. Warming winters are leading to loss of lake ice and changing snow cover on seasonally freezing lakes. Past neglect of the ice cover period by lake scientists has resulted in critical data and theory gaps about the role of winter conditions in lake ecosystem function and the effects of changing winters on aquatic systems. [...]
A non-invasive approach to measuring body dimensions of wildlife with camera-traps: a felid field trial
Published: 2024-01-29
Subjects: Life Sciences
Dimensions of body size are an important measurement in animal ecology, though they can be difficult to obtain due to the effort and cost associated with the invasive nature of these measurements. We avoid these limitations by using camera-trap images to derive dimensions of animal size. To obtain measurements of object dimensions using this method, the size of the object in pixels, the focal [...]
Experimental protocol for validation of Computational Fluid Dynamics palaeoecological simulations
Published: 2024-01-29
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations are increasingly used to test palaeoecological hypotheses. These analyses output simulated velocity and pressure flow profiles, and drag and lift force values acting on a model. These outputs are presumed to be internally consistent, assuming consistently applied parameters, but it is unclear whether these reflect real-world force measurements. [...]
The fossil record of the Neogene Carnivore Mammals from Spain
Published: 2024-01-25
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Carnivore mammals (Carnivora, Mammalia) constitute a significant component of the Spanish Neogene faunas, not so much due to their fossil abundance, which is generally low, but rather because of their high degree of taxonomic diversity. We assessed their evolutionary dynamics from the fossil record of Iberian carnivores using per-taxon rates of origination, extinctions and turnover combined with [...]
Conceptual Models regarding Internal and External Dynamics and Their Interaction in Biological Phenomena
Published: 2024-01-25
Subjects: Life Sciences
Much research has been done on the evolutionary processes and general properties of life from the fields of systems biology, mathematical biology, and evolutionary biology. Life is a system in which micro and macro are coordinated and subsystems are organized to maintain metabolism and function. Life also has systems that maintain homeostasis within the body. Life adapts to time and space, [...]
Hybridization potential of brown trout, with particular reference to invaded environments
Published: 2024-01-25
Subjects: Aquaculture and Fisheries Life Sciences, Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Population Biology
Hybridization is a complex process beginning with the mating of two species. However, hybrid offspring frequency does not predict hetero-specific mating frequency, as post-mating, both pre-zygotic and post-zygotic barriers influence their occurrence. Post-zygotic outbreeding depression usually results in poor embryo-juvenile survival or the production of sterile hybrid offspring. Females have [...]
Parasitism and the tradeoffs of social grouping: The role of parasite transmission mode
Published: 2024-01-25
Subjects: Life Sciences
Animals form social groups to gain benefits to numerous fitness-enhancing processes, such as foraging, defense, and energy expenditure. While social grouping can increase parasite exposure, it can also serve as a defensive mechanism against parasites (defined broadly here as organisms with obligate, persistent, and harmful consumer associations with a host). Here, we present a conceptual [...]