Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Lipid Metabolism in Response to Cold
Published: 2023-03-01
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology
Temperature directly shapes insect physiology and has a preponderant effect on life history traits. Winter conditions in temperate and polar regions are especially challenging for insects. Extremely low temperatures can indeed compromise insect survival by promoting freezing of body fluids, but mild cold temperatures above 0 °C (i.e. chilling) can also lead to complex and severe physiological [...]
How do microbes grow in nature? The role of population dynamics in microbial ecology and evolution
Published: 2023-02-25
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Evolution, Life Sciences, Microbiology, Systems Biology
The growth of microbial populations in nature is dynamic, as the cellular physiology and environment of these populations change. Population dynamics have wide-ranging consequences for ecology and evolution, determining how species interact and which mutations fix. Understanding these dynamics is also critical for clinical and environmental applications in which we need to promote or inhibit [...]
Solar radiation drives potential demographic collapse in a perennial bunchgrass via dramatically reduced seedling establishment
Published: 2023-02-20
Subjects: Biology, Desert Ecology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Other Plant Sciences, Plant Sciences, Population Biology, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Many perennial plants in semi-arid rangelands have experienced population declines, and understanding the ecological and demographic processes behind these declines is important to slowing or reversing them. Although anthropogenic disturbances drive many declines, other sorts of environmental variability, such as the differences in solar radiation with aspect, may impact population success [...]
Extra-pair paternity, breeding density and synchrony in natural cavities versus nestboxes in two passerine birds
Published: 2023-02-17
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences, Ornithology
Most of what is known about extra-pair paternity in hole-nesting birds derives from studies using artificial nesting sites, such as nestboxes. However, it has rarely been investigated whether inference drawn from breeding events taking place in nestboxes matches what would be observed under natural conditions, i.e. in natural cavities. We here report on a variation in promiscuity in blue tits and [...]
Keep your cool: Overwintering physiology in response to urbanization in the acorn ant, Temnothorax curvispinosus
Published: 2023-02-10
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Winter presents a challenge for survival, yet temperate ectotherms have remarkable physiological adaptations to cope with low-temperature conditions. Under recent climate change, rather than strictly relaxing pressure on overwintering survival, warmer winters can instead disrupt these low-temperature trait-environment associations, with negative consequences for populations. While there is [...]
Statistical methods to identify mechanisms in studies of eco-evolutionary dynamics
Published: 2023-02-07
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
While the reciprocal effects of ecological and evolutionary dynamics are increasingly recognized as an important driver for biodiversity, detection of such eco-evolutionary feedbacks, their underlying mechanisms, and their consequences remains challenging. Eco-evolutionary dynamics occur at different spatial and temporal scales and can leave signatures at different levels of organization (e.g., [...]
What acoustic telemetry can and can’t tell us about fish biology
Published: 2023-02-07
Subjects: Animal Sciences, Aquaculture and Fisheries Life Sciences, Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Zoology
Acoustic telemetry (AT) has become ubiquitous in aquatic monitoring and fish biology, conservation and management. Since the early use of active ultrasonic tracking that required researchers to follow at a distance their species of interest, the field has diversified considerably with exciting advances in both hydrophone and transmitter technology. Once a highly specialised methodology however, [...]
The impact of helping on helper life-history and fitness in a cooperatively breeding bird
Published: 2023-02-03
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Cooperative breeding occurs when helpers provide alloparental care to the offspring of a breeding pair. One hypothesis of why helping occurs is that helpers gain valuable experience (skills) that may increase their own future reproductive success. However, research typically focuses on the effect of helping on short-term measures of reproductive success. Fewer studies have considered how helping [...]
Using repeatability of performance within and across contexts to validate measures of behavioral flexibility
Published: 2023-01-31
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Research into animal cognitive abilities is increasing quickly and often uses methods where behavioral performance on a task is assumed to represent variation in the underlying cognitive trait. However, because these methods rely on behavioral responses as a proxy for cognitive ability, it is important to validate that the task structure does, in fact, target the cognitive trait of interest [...]
The impact of rising temperatures on the prevalence of coral diseases and its predictability: a global meta-analysis
Published: 2023-01-24
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Immunology and Infectious Disease, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Statistical Models
Coral reefs are under threat from disease as climate change alters environmental conditions. Rising temperatures exacerbate coral disease, but this relationship is likely complex as other factors also influence coral disease prevalence. To better understand this relationship, we meta-analytically examined 108 studies for changes in global coral disease over time alongside temperature, expressed [...]
Why do some fish grow faster than others?
Published: 2023-01-23
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Integrative Biology, Physiology
All animals must acquire food to grow, but there is a vast diversity in how different species and even different individuals approach and achieve this task. Individuals within a species appear to fall along a bold-shy continuum, whereby some fish acquire food aggressively and with seemingly high risk, while others appear more submissive and opportunistic. Greater food consumption generally [...]
Beta diversity of restored river dike grasslands is strongly influenced by uncontrolled spatio-temporal variability
Published: 2023-01-20
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
1. Spatio-temporal dynamics of biodiversity are a key measure when monitoring restoration success. Balanced species turnover is aimed at because it increases overall biodiversity and improves ecosystem stability and multifunctionality. For predictive restoration, it is important to analyse spatial beta diversity and to identify its drivers like site characteristics but also uncontrolled factors [...]
The missing link: discerning true from false negatives when sampling species interaction networks
Published: 2023-01-19
Subjects: Applied Statistics, Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Monitoring
Ecosystems are composed of networks of interacting species. These interactions allow communities of species to persist through time through both neutral and adaptive processes. Despite their importance, a robust understanding of (and ability to predict and forecast) interactions among species remains elusive. This knowledge-gap is largely driven by a shortfall of data—although species occurrence [...]
Evolutionary Game Theory and the Adaptive Dynamics Approach: Adaptation where Individuals Interact
Published: 2023-01-17
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Evolutionary game theory and the adaptive dynamics approach have made invaluable contributions to understand how gradual evolution leads to adaptation when individuals interact. Here, we review some of the basic tools that have come out of these contributions to model the evolution of quantitative traits in complex populations. We collect together mathematical expressions that describe [...]
Anti-predator defenses are linked with high levels of genetic differentiation in frogs
Published: 2023-01-15
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Predator-prey interactions have been suggested as drivers of diversity in different lineages, and the presence of anti-predator defences in some clades is linked to higher rates of diversification. Warning signals are some of the most widespread defenses in the animal world, and there is evidence of higher diversification rates in aposematic lineages. The mechanisms behind such species richness, [...]