Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Earlier and increased growth of tundra willows after a decade of growth in a warmer common garden environment
Published: 2024-11-08
Subjects: Biology, Botany, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Plant Biology, Plant Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
1. The expansion of woody shrubs, known as shrubification, is one of the most widely observed patterns of vegetation change in the tundra. Yet, we do not know the relative importance of plant plasticity and genetic change in determining shrub responses to warming. Plastic responses to the environment can be rapid, while genetic differentiation is much slower. 2. We established a common garden [...]
Altered phenotypic responses of asexual Arctic Daphnia after 10 years of rapid climate change
Published: 2024-11-05
Subjects: Comparative and Evolutionary Physiology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Genetics and Genomics, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Understanding the fates of organisms and ecosystems under global change requires consideration of the organisms’ rapid adaptation potential. In the Arctic, the recent temperature increase strongly impacts freshwater ecosystems which are important sentinels for climate change. However, a mechanistic understanding on the adaptive capacity of their key zooplankton grazers, among them polyploid, [...]
Beyond the concrete jungle: The value of urban biodiversity for regional conservation efforts
Published: 2024-11-04
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Urbanization deletes and degrades natural ecosystems, contributing to the ongoing biodiversity crisis. Yet, on the local scale, well-managed cities can host significant biodiversity, including endemic and threatened species. Understanding the trade-off between local and regional biodiversity outcomes is limited, primarily due to the lack of comprehensive sampling across heterogeneous urban areas [...]
Niche dynamics of alien plant species in Mediterranean Europe
Published: 2024-11-03
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Plant Sciences
Aim Humans have spread plants globally for millennia, inadvertently causing ecological disruptions. However, biological invasions also provide a unique opportunity to study the process of niche dynamics, through which species adapt their niche when confronted with novel environments. Focusing on the Mediterranean Basin, we assessed 1) which traits favour niche dynamics, and 2) whether niche [...]
Meromixis in the Anthropocene: pathways of change
Published: 2024-11-03
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Continental-scale empirical evidence for relationships between fire response strategies and fire frequency
Published: 2024-11-03
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
• Theory suggests that the dominance of resprouting and seeding, two key mechanisms through which plants persist with recurrent fire, both depend on other traits and vary with fire regime. However, these patterns remain largely untested over broad scales. • We analysed the relationships between average fire frequency, derived from MODIS satellite data, and resprouting and seeding strategies [...]
Time will tell: the temporal and demographic contexts of plant-soil microbe interactions
Published: 2024-10-31
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Soil microorganisms can have profound impacts on plant community dynamics and have received increasing attention in the context of plant-soil feedback. The effects of soil microbes on plant community dynamics are classically evaluated with a two-phase experimental design that consists of a conditioning phase, during which plants modify the soil microbial community, and a response phase, during [...]
Priced out of belonging? Insufficient concessions on membership fees across international societies in ecology and evolution
Published: 2024-10-30
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Learned societies, as professional bodies for scientists, are an integral part of the scientific system. However, their membership fees have the potential to be prohibitive to the most vulnerable members of the scientific community. To shed light on how membership fees are structured, we conducted a survey of 182 international learned societies relevant to researchers in ecology and evolution. We [...]
Decadal recovery of fungal but not termite deadwood decay in tropical rainforest
Published: 2024-10-30
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
1. Deadwood represents ~11% of carbon stocks in tropical rainforest ecosystems and its decay is driven largely by fungi and termites which contribute to the cycling of carbon and nutrients. Due to land use change, such as forest clearing, secondary growth tropical rainforests are increasingly prevalent around the globe. In secondary growth rainforest, studies found lower decay rates of leaf [...]
Reimagining species on the move across space and time
Published: 2024-10-29
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Climate change is already leaving a broad footprint of impacts on biodiversity, from an individual caterpillar emerging earlier in spring to an entire plant community migrating poleward. Despite the various modes of how species are on the move, we primarily document shifting species along only one gradient (e.g., latitude or phenology) and along one dimension (space or time). Here we present a [...]
BON in a Box: An Open and Collaborative Platform for Biodiversity Monitoring, Indicator Calculation, and Reporting
Published: 2024-10-28
Subjects: Animal Sciences, Biodiversity, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Forest Sciences, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Plant Sciences
Biodiversity loss is a critical global challenge. The Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) sets ambitious goals to protect ecosystems, halt species loss, and enhance biodiversity. The GBF’s Monitoring Framework requires countries to track progress toward biodiversity targets using a standardized set of indicators that summarize complex trends in biodiversity. However, the [...]
Beyond single invaders: Disentangling the effects of co-invading alien herbs on sandy old-fields
Published: 2024-10-27
Subjects: Biodiversity, Botany, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Aims Invasive alien plants can severely impact ecosystem diversity and function. While individual species’ effects are often studied, the interaction between multiple invasive species is less understood. This study examines how Asclepias syriaca and Solidago spp. (including Solidago gigantea and S. canadensis) influence taxonomic and functional diversity in sandy old-fields. The aims are to: (1) [...]
Patterns of fruit production in tropical forests are shifting with negative outnumbering positive trends
Published: 2024-10-25
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Forest Sciences, Life Sciences, Plant Sciences
The impacts of climate change and anthropogenic disturbance are increasingly evident in the structure and demographics of tropical forests, yet the response of tree reproduction remains poorly understood. As fruit and seed production is the first step in forest recruitment, this gap is critical to understanding tropical forest resilience. Tropical fruits are important in diets of numerous [...]
A habitat suitability model for testing and refining the range of Zuni fleabane, a threatened plant species
Published: 2024-10-23
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Land managers and conservation practitioners need practical tools to protect rare species in light of rapidly changing climate and land use patterns. Habitat suitability models are tools that can inform multiple-use land management decisions and target conservation actions. The narrow endemic Zuni fleabane, Erigeron rhizomatus, occurs on lands managed for multiple uses and was listed as [...]
Coexistence theory for microbial ecology, and vice versa
Published: 2024-10-21
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Microbiology
Classical models from theoretical ecology are seeing increasing uptake in microbial ecology, but there remains rich potential for closer cross-pollination. Here we explore opportunities for stronger integration of ecological theory into microbial research (and vice versa) through the lens of so-called "modern" coexistence theory. Coexistence theory encompasses a body of theory for disentangling [...]