Preprints
There are 3338 Preprints listed.
Soma as transmission control in multicellular evolution: a population-genetic framework for germline restriction and cellular altruism
Published: 2026-06-08
Subjects: Genetics, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
A central question in the evolution of multicellularity is why lineages repeatedly transition from germ-dominated unicellular states to organizations with extensive somatic investment. If somatic cells are largely excluded from future generations, why are they produced at all, and why do soma-free multicellular alternatives appear limited in stability, persistence, or attainable complexity? Here, [...]
Intertidal Exposure Modulates Time-Integrated Heat Tolerance of the Eastern Oyster Crassostrea virginica
Published: 2026-06-07
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
The rise of unprecedented heatwaves globally has caused an increase in mass mortality events, motivating the need for accurate predictions of population declines. Predicting organismal function under fluctuating thermal regimes is a central challenge in thermal biology, particularly in intertidal systems where organisms experience rapid shifts between submerged and aerial exposure. Here, we [...]
An action-oriented research agenda for equitable and meaningful nature-based solutions in urban areas
Published: 2026-06-06
Subjects: Biodiversity, Environmental Studies, Public Health, Urban Studies and Planning
Nature-based solutions provide opportunities to address the urgent, interconnected global challenges of environmental conservation, public health, and social justice in urban areas. Despite growing interest among policy-makers, the outcomes of nature-based solutions at the nexus of biodiversity, human health, and social justice are not well understood. We gathered a group of experts from [...]
Symbiont interactions bias measures of arthropod biodiversity
Published: 2026-06-06
Subjects: Biodiversity, Entomology
Although arthropods comprise the majority of all named species, their biodiversity is relatively understudied. Here, we highlight how interactions between arthropods and their bacterial symbionts can pose challenges for biodiversity research, especially for estimating taxonomic, functional, and genetic diversity. We also argue that recent technological developments and biomonitoring schemes [...]
Comparative urban behaviour of two sympatric columbids: Columba palumbus and Columba livia
Published: 2026-06-05
Subjects: Life Sciences
Urban environments favour species tolerant of human disturbance. We compared time budgets and anti-predator behaviour of the common wood pigeon (Columba palumbus) and rock pigeon (Columba livia) in five urban parks in León (Spain) using video recordings and predator approach tests. The common wood pigeon devoted most time to foraging (81.1%) with moderate vigilance (9.9%), while the rock pigeon [...]
Trophic interactions of ants are robust to tree species loss
Published: 2026-06-05
Subjects: Entomology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
1. How changes in habitat conditions influence insect diversity has been intensively studied. However, whether trophic interactions of insects are also influenced by such changes is largely unknown. Higher habitat heterogeneity is often hypothesized to promote niche partitioning and complementarity in resource use among interacting species, yet evidence from animal interaction networks is sparse. [...]
Modelling habitat selection using tracking data from central place foraging species: A practical guide for ecologists
Published: 2026-06-04
Subjects: Applied Statistics, Behavior and Ethology, Biostatistics, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Natural Resources and Conservation, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Research Methods in Life Sciences, Statistical Methodology, Statistical Models
The study of habitat selection has long been at the heart of ecological research and is critical to deciphering the mechanisms that govern species’ responses to global change. This is particularly important for central place foraging species, whose ability to adapt to shifting environmental conditions and anthropogenic disturbance is limited by persistent attachment to a fixed site. Recent [...]
Recreational fishing drives the global spread of aquatic non-native species
Published: 2026-06-04
Subjects: Aquaculture and Fisheries Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Recreational fishing provides substantial socio-economic benefits worldwide, yet its role in driving aquatic biological invasions remains insufficiently understood. Here, we assessed global evidence for recreational fisheries-mediated introductions of aquatic non-native species. Using a systematic review of 140 retained studies, we compared temporal trends, geographic coverage, introduction [...]
Problems of geometry, sampling, and scale in gridded biodiversity data, and proposed solutions
Published: 2026-06-03
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Grids, and gridded biodiversity data such as regional or country-level atlases, play a prominent role in ecology, particularly in the study of spatial patterns of species occupancy, geographic ranges, biodiversity, and their drivers and temporal dynamics. However, managing, exploring, and analyzing data in grids comes with problems. Here, we review the problems with gridded data, and the existing [...]
Two centuries of decline and partial recovery of fish in rivers of post-industrial northeast England: lessons for global rivers in the Anthropocene
Published: 2026-06-03
Subjects: Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Understanding the historical decline in ecological condition of rivers, their fish stocks, and of their restoration, offers one perspective by which contemporary threats to river fishes in less developed regions may be assessed. We explore the decline and recovery of fish populations in rivers (Tyne, Wear, Tees) of post-industrial northeast England. Before ~1850, Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and [...]
Computable Nature Dependency in a Watershed Knowledge Graph
Published: 2026-06-03
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Systems Biology
Resolving nature-related financial risk and watershed resilience requires a representational shift from opaque, aggregate indices to auditable, mechanistic pathways. Current natural-capital workflows often succumb to an "epistemic collapse", where granular ecological interactions are erased in favor of sector-level proxies or spatial heatmaps that lack a downstream asset trace. Here, we present a [...]
Predicting substrate size at a watershed scale to inform conservation planning for a declining salmonid species
Published: 2026-06-02
Subjects: Biology, Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Sciences, Hydrology, Life Sciences, Natural Resources and Conservation, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Good quality spawning habitat is critical for fish embryo development, survival, and overall population productivity. Appropriate riverbed substrate size is particularly important for riverine-spawning salmonids but the availability of suitable substrate may vary across a watershed. Predicting substrate size at watershed extents may therefore be critical to inform management and conservation of [...]
From social experience to social behaviour: hormonal and behavioural phenotypes during adolescence in male guinea pigs
Published: 2026-06-02
Subjects: Animal Sciences, Biology, Life Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Adolescence is the transition from juvenility to adulthood and is characterized by prominent endocrine, neural and behavioural alterations. Thus, adolescence represents a sensitive phase during which social experiences can shape endocrine and behavioural phenotypes. Although the influence of the social environment during adolescence has been widely investigated, most studies assessed such effects [...]
Between categories and continua: growth-form organization in global leaf economics spectrum space
Published: 2026-06-02
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
The leaf economics spectrum (LES) describes a globally coordinated trade-off between acquisitive and conservative plant resource-use strategies, yet how major plant growth forms are organized within multidimensional LES space and the extent to which these patterns reflect evolutionary history remain incompletely resolved. Using species-level trait data from the TRY Plant Trait Database, we [...]
Motivations and organizational models for private sector biodiversity engagement
Published: 2026-06-02
Subjects: Agriculture, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Private sector engagement is increasingly recognized as critical for addressing global biodiversity loss, yet the recent IPBES global assessment of business and biodiversity confirms that current economic conditions remain largely incompatible with the transformative change required. We conducted 30 semi-structured interviews with business leaders and sustainability practitioners across multiple [...]