Filtering by Subject: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Published: 2022-08-13
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
In this paper, we evaluate debates surrounding calls for an Extended Evolutionary Synthesis in light of the Darwinian core of evolutionary theory, which was somewhat broader than the Modern Synthesis. We suggest that Darwin’s nuanced operationalization of natural selection rested upon two innovations: the atomization of individuals into trait-variants, and a reconceptualization of heredity in [...]
Published: 2022-08-10
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Behavioral flexibility, adapting behavior to changing situations, is hypothesized to be related to adapting to new environments and geographic range expansions. However, flexibility is rarely directly tested in a way that allows insight into how flexibility works. Research on great-tailed grackles, a bird species that has rapidly expanded their range into North America over the past 140 years, [...]
Published: 2022-08-10
Subjects: Animal Experimentation and Research, Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Research Methods in 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 [...]
Published: 2022-08-01
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List is an important and widely used conservation prioritization tool. It uses information about species range size, habitat quality and fragmentation levels, and trends in abundance to assess species extinction risk. Genetic erosion is an additional key factor determining extinction risk, but the Red List was not designed to assess [...]
Published: 2022-07-30
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Transposable elements (TEs), also known as transposons, are repetitive DNA sequences, present in virtually all organisms, that can move from one genomic position to another. TEs can be a source of mutations with important consequences for organisms. Despite their interest, its repetitive nature has made their study very challenging. However, the emergence of new sequencing technologies that allow [...]
Published: 2022-07-29
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Studies, Life Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences
As the twenty-first century unfolds, the human-driven decline of life on Earth is of greater concern and, despite tremendous growth in the volume of conservation science and many local successes, shows no clear signs of improvement. As a matter of fact, the reversal of nature’s ongoing decline is only possible with urgent “transformative change” However, no transformative changes are viable [...]
Published: 2022-07-29
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Despite the importance of vocalizations in mammalian sociosexual communication, little is known about female preferences for male vocal displays in wild mammals. Here, we characterized female preferences for the advertisement songs of male Alston’s singing mice (Scotinomys teguina). We developed procedures for inducing estrus, using vaginal morphology as a bioindicator. We then broadcasted [...]
Published: 2022-07-27
Subjects: Bioinformatics, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences, Population Biology
Light skin facilitates the penetration of ultraviolet light (UV) radiation through the skin, increasing the synthesis of vitamin D that in turn stimulates bone formation. It has been suggested that light skin appeared in the ancestors of modern Europeans as an adaptation to the conditions of low UV radiation in high latitudes; however, paleogenetic studies have recently shown it did not evolve [...]
Published: 2022-07-27
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Population Biology
Social networks are tied to population dynamics; interactions are driven by population density and demographic structure, while social relationships can be key determinants of survival and reproductive success. However, difficulties integrating models used in demography and network analysis have limited research at this interface. We introduce the R package genNetDem for simulating integrated [...]
Published: 2022-07-25
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Helicopter skiing is a popular adventure tourism activity that occurs within the range of mountain goats (Oreamnos americanus) and/or woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) in British Columbia and, to a lesser extent in adjacent jurisdictions. Both are species of concern, with known or suspected population declines occurring in substantial portions of their respective ranges. Whether [...]
Published: 2022-07-25
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Despite the remarkable diversity of life forms on earth, evolutionary biologists have discovered numerous instances where even distantly related species share astonishing similarities in how they behave, look, and function. Given the importance of happenstance in evolution (e.g., random mutations, genetic drift, environmental stochasticity), it is often assumed that the mechanisms underlying such [...]
Published: 2022-07-21
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Woodland caribou are considered to preferentially use older forests that provide abundant terrestrial lichen forage and refuge from predators. However, structural characteristics vary widely, differing in terms of forage availability but also, perhaps, in the ability of caribou to move freely through forests to access the available forage or to escape predation. We examined the effect of forest [...]
Published: 2022-07-20
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Dominance hierarchies direct and structure aggression in a myriad of species. Recent computational approaches have been able to detect additional aggression patterns within animal dominance hierarchies based on relative rank differences between individuals. Within species, distinct groups can follow different social dominance patterns, indicating that these patterns should not be thought of as a [...]
Published: 2022-07-18
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Research Methods in Life Sciences
1. Functional diversity is widely used and widespread. However, the main package used to compute functional diversity indices FD is not flexible and not adapted to the volume of data used in modern ecological analyses. 2. We here present fundiversity, an R package that eases the computation of classical functional diversity indices. It leverages parallelization and memoization (caching results [...]
Published: 2022-07-15
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Individualized social niches arise in social groups and are associated with behavior and hormone (e.g. cortisol) concentrations. During sensitive life phases, social interactions can have a profound impact on the development of social behavior. Focusing on adolescence, we aimed to investigate the relationship between the social niche, social behavior, and cortisol concentrations (baseline and [...]