Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Life Sciences
The Origins of Human Cooperation Through Intergroup Relations in Our Closest Living Relatives
Published: 2025-12-10
Subjects: Life Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Cooperation is the foundation of human society, yet our understanding of its evolutionary origins and underlying mechanisms remains limited. This review draws on intergroup encounters in our closest evolutionary relatives, chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and bonobos (Pan paniscus), to better understand the evolutionary pressures and processes that shaped human cooperation. In chimpanzees, [...]
PROPOSAL of A MONITORING PLAN for THE EUROPEAN EEL, ANGUILLA ANGUILLA L. 1758, IN SICILY.
Published: 2025-12-10
Subjects: Life Sciences
We outline a monitoring plan for European eel that has been proposed in 2021, as part of of the preparatory activities for the elaboration of the Regional Eel Management Plan for Sicily (project FEAMP OP 2014/2020, MEASURE 2.49, Sicilian Regional Administration), to be included in the National Management Plan (Regulation EC 1100/2007). Sampling methods and time-frames diversified for juveniles, [...]
A Satellite-based Approach to Investigating Eutrophication in Lakes Receiving Wastewater Treatment Effluent: A Case Study of Lake Windermere
Published: 2025-12-10
Subjects: Life Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Excessive phosphorus from the sewer systems in the UK is a major contributor to eutrophication in freshwater bodies. Chlorophyll-a levels are widely used as a reliable indicator of phosphorus driven eutrophication, and satellite remote sensing provides an effective means of monitoring these dynamics at high spatial and temporal resolution. This study evaluated the utility of Sentinel-2 imagery in [...]
Acorn availability reduces agricultural damage by ungulates
Published: 2025-12-10
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Human-wildlife conflicts, particularly the damage to agricultural crops caused by ungulates, pose significant ecological and economic challenges. Understanding the role of natural food availability in driving these conflicts is important for developing effective management strategies. We investigated how the pulsed availability of forest tree seeds, i.e., mast seeding, influences the extent of [...]
The Plant Communities of Oman’s Central Coastline: A Baseline Ecological Assessment amid Rising Threats
Published: 2025-12-10
Subjects: Biodiversity, Botany, Desert Ecology, Life Sciences, Plant Sciences
In recent decades, the botanical knowledge within the Sultanate of Oman has advanced considerably. However, the coastal vegetation is comparatively understudied with much of the country’s extensive coastline still undocumented. This is despite Oman’s coast being faced with a plethora of threats including development, overgrazing and the invasive species Neltuma juliflora. This study presents the [...]
Microbial contributions to host life history tradeoffs
Published: 2025-12-09
Subjects: Life Sciences
All organisms must allocate finite resources among growth, maintenance, and reproduction, generating trade-offs that constrain adaptation. Here, we argue that host microbiomes are dynamic resource engines capable of reallocating and generating energy and resources for their hosts. In doing so, they may recalibrate the tradeoffs fundamental to life history evolution.
Quantifying Three Decades of Artisanal and Small-scale Gold Mining Frontiers in the Guiana Shield (1995–2024)
Published: 2025-12-09
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Biodiversity, Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Sciences, Geography, Life Sciences, Natural Resources and Conservation, Remote Sensing, Sustainability, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Artisanal and Small-scale Gold Mining (ASGM) is a leading driver of tropical deforestation and forest degradation, yet its spatial and temporal dynamics remain largely underexplored. Here, we present a pan-regional, annual time-series analysis of ASGM expansion across rainforests of the Guiana Shield (Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana) from 1995 to 2024. Using Landsat imagery, we trained a deep [...]
A chronosequence of human remains on soil microbial populations
Published: 2025-12-08
Subjects: Life Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Surficial human decomposition produces substantial and measurable shifts in soil chemistry and microbial composition. This decade-long investigation examined temporal changes beneath surface deposited human remains and identified strong microbial and chemical responses in the first twelve to twenty four months, including decreased microbial diversity, elevated soil nutrients and sustained [...]
Gene expression and structural differences underpinning black and white colouration in spiders
Published: 2025-12-05
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences
The presence of multiple colour variants within a single population, known as colour polymorphism, is a striking example of intraspecific phenotypic variation and a model for studying evolutionary processes. These processes depend on the underlying mechanisms such as the genes and pigments involved; but we currently lack such information for non-model groups such as arachnids. We examined the [...]
Butterfly abundances but not patch occupancy buffered by vegetation heterogeneity during climatic extremes
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
As extreme climatic events are becoming more frequent and intense, we need to understand what mechanisms could buffer populations from climate change impacts to ensure their persistence. Fragmented populations may be especially vulnerable to climate change, as exemplified by species with metapopulation dynamics, whose persistence is determined by a precarious balance between frequent local [...]
Identification of the Cichlid Fishes of Lake Malawi/Nyasa Part 3: Rhamphochromina and others.
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Life Sciences
With an estimated 800-1000 species, the cichlid fishes of Lake Malawi represent the largest known adaptive radiation of vertebrates from common ancestry in a limited geographical area, in this case a single lake. Although they represent a major system for the study of evolution, and have considerable local economic value, the presence of so many closely-related and poorly known species presents [...]
Leveraging publicly available data to facilitate urban ecology and evolution
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Life Sciences
The intensifying pace of urbanization has prompted researchers to investigate its ecological and evolutionary consequences more deeply, yet logistic and monetary challenges can impose a barrier to research. Publicly available databases offer scientists from broad backgrounds an opportunity to circumvent those barriers, enhancing participation in urban ecology and evolution. In conjunction with [...]
POLLEN ANALYSIS AS A REMOTE BIOLOGICAL SENSOR: USING MELISSOPALYNOLOGY AND SURFACE SOIL DATA FOR AN INTEGRATED LANDSCAPE SCALE VEGETATION ASSESSMENT IN SOUTH INDIA
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Botany, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Other Life Sciences, Other Plant Sciences, Plant Sciences
We use pollen assemblages from two sources, surface soil and bee pollen to characterize modern pollen spectra from contrasting landscapes, evaluate their potential as biological proxies complementing each other in reconstructing vegetation comprised of anemophilous and entomophilous plants. The bee pollen assemblages are from honeycombs and corbicular loads from Apis cerana and A. florea. We try [...]
African swine fever vs. COVID-19: only one virus mattered for wild boar hunting bags in Europe
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Life Sciences
Wild boar (Sus scrofa) populations have been steadily increasing across Europe in the last decades, due to the synergy between landscape modifications, the ecological plasticity of the species and global warming. However, since 2014, an increasing number of these populations have also been affected by African swine fever (ASF) and have experienced increased mortality. Moreover, in 2020 and 2021, [...]
On the spatial aggregation of condition metrics for ecosystem accounting
Published: 2025-12-03
Subjects: Applied Statistics, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment, Environmental Monitoring, Life Sciences, Other Life Sciences
In face of the ongoing nature crisis, the international community is setting targets and deciding on actions to combat the current biodiversity crises. For this to be effective they need tools to accurately describe the current situation and to monitor trends in ecosystems over time. Ecosystem condition accounts (ECA) is one such tool that use variables and indicators to describe key ecosystem [...]