Preprints
There are 3785 Preprints listed.
Spatial variation in keystone predation on foundation species drives local and landscape- scale diversity patterns
Published: 2026-10-13
Subjects: Biodiversity, Marine Biology, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
The proposition that keystone predators increase biodiversity has been criticized for failing to consider the species facilitated by, rather than outcompeted by, dominant prey. Here, we revisit the relationship between the original keystone species, Pisaster ochraceus, and the diversity of rocky intertidal communities inclusive of competitively dominant prey, competitively subordinate [...]
The ecological world of driver ants (Dorylus): a review
Published: 2026-10-13
Subjects: Life Sciences
Driver ants (Dorylus) are among the most conspicuous and abundant predators in continental Africa. Their enormous surface-swarm raids and nomadic lifestyle have captivated naturalists for over 150 years, yet their ecology remains surprisingly poorly understood, especially compared to their Neotropical counterparts. Here, we review the ecology of African driver ants, synthesising knowledge of [...]
The role of environmental gradients in the ontogenetic shift of wood traits from seedlings to adults in two temperate tree species
Published: 2026-10-13
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Tree development, or ontogeny, involves concurrent changes in plant size and environmental conditions, both of which can influence wood structure and function. Disentangling the factors underlying ontogenetic variation in wood traits remains a major challenge. This is important because wood underpins hydraulic efficiency, hydraulic safety, and mechanical support - functions critical for tree [...]
Where are the hake going? How age, environmental signals, and shelf habitat shape Pacific Hake (Merluccius productus) summer distribution
Published: 2026-10-13
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Marine Biology
Sustainably managing a multinational fishery on a transboundary, relatively long-lived and migratory fish stock is challenging, especially in a changing ocean environment. In a warming world, Pacific hake (Merluccius productus, Merluccidae), jointly managed by the U.S. and Canada, have been hypothesized to move north. However, in recent years the proportion of Pacific hake in the northern part of [...]
Large Language Models for Marine Protected Area Design and Management Planning
Published: 2026-10-12
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Biodiversity, Bioinformatics, Natural Resources and Conservation
Achieving biodiversity targets requires advances in marine conservation planning and action. We make three arguments about large language models (LLMs): they add more value when embedded within decision-support systems; they integrate fragmented expertise, data, and tools; they can increase capacity in under-resourced settings through co-design. We illustrate these arguments with a conceptual [...]
Potential impacts of Ground-mounted photovoltaic panels on land cover and carbon storage in Norway – a scenario analysis
Published: 2026-10-12
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Energy Policy, Environmental Policy, Life Sciences, Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
In cool-temperate and boreal regions, ground-mounted photovoltaic (PV) is rapidly emerging as a new land use, but planning-relevant evidence on land requirements, siting options, and land-system impacts remains limited. Based on an analysis of built and planned ground-mounted PV projects in Norway (n = 77), we quantify size, capacity density, land-cover composition and net greenhouse gas effects, [...]
Anthropogenic food subsidies shape parental foraging and offspring development in an opportunistic bird
Published: 2026-10-12
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
Humans are transforming ecosystems by providing predictable anthropogenic food subsidies (PAFS), such as at landfills, now used by multiple animal taxa. In breeding animals, parental landfill use can influence offspring development, yet few studies have quantified parental landfill use and linked it to parental care and offspring development, behaviour or survival, limiting our understanding of [...]
Why are insects attracted to light?
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Life Sciences
The sight of insects swarming around lamps is ancient and well known, but the reasons for this behavior remain disputed. We propose that attraction to light is not merely a sensory accident, but an adaptive strategy during nuptial flights: under certain conditions, flying toward a light source can be the optimal way to encounter mates, because it aligns flight with pheromone gradients and [...]
Disease-Dependent Social Responses to Local Disease Composition in a Wild Reptile
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Emerging infectious diseases can generate persistent and locally heterogeneous patterns of risk across animal populations, yet how animal social behaviour varies under these conditions remains poorly understood. When pathogens persist in the environment, individuals may need to respond to disease conditions at fine spatial and temporal scales rather than rely on fixed social strategies. Here, we [...]
Spatially explicit sampling of AM fungal biomass reveals links to community characteristics and landscape context
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Agriculture, Biochemistry, Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi are important contributors to soil functioning, yet their biomass and diversity may respond differently to environmental characteristics and historical legacies. Understanding these relationships is necessary for evaluating AM fungi as indicators of soil health. We investigated relationships among AM fungal biomass, community properties and natural habitat [...]
Projecting kinship networks through time in variable environments
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Life Sciences, Population Biology, Social and Behavioral Sciences, Social and Cultural Anthropology
Kinship networks shape key biological and social processes, yet their dynamics under changing environments remain poorly understood. Like population abundances, kinship structures are determined by past vital rates. Matrix population models provide a powerful framework for projecting population abundances through time and analysing the effects of environmental change on population dynamics, but [...]
Social decision-making in a freshwater gastropod
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Animal Studies, Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Animals are hypothesized to plastically adjust their social behaviour expression dependent on their environment and their phenotype to ensure that its benefits outweigh its costs. There is a strong research bias towards socially complex vertebrates and eusocial insects. Thus, here we study mollusks, a taxon whose social behaviour is less well studied. As predation is one of the strongest drivers [...]
A unified systems model for evolution. Implications for human behaviour and survival
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Life Sciences
Here we present a systems-based and unified theory of evolution, more consistent with biological complexity than previous unified models, and addressing popular misconceptions about ‘survival of the fittest’ that have contributed to overcompetitive and overaggressive attitudes in our social and economic systems. These attitudes have played an important part in the global metacrisis of today. We [...]
Encounter behaviour shapes ecological distributions
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Marine Biology, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Population Biology, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Ecology’s foundational models keep only the first moment of the stochastic distributions of encounters. Yet, encounter behaviour (how animals search, aggregate, hide and move) sets the whole distributional shape: zeros, variance, skew and, where particular behaviours build them, heavy tails. That shape decides vital rates, persistence and spatial pattern, because the rates involved are [...]
Soil amendments for cost-effective tropical forest restoration
Published: 2026-10-08
Subjects: Life Sciences
Introduction: Low-cost soil amendments hold promise for improving assisted forest restoration outcomes and reducing dependence on emission-intensive inputs, yet rigorous field-based comparisons of novel and standard amendments, including cost-effectiveness, remain rare. Objectives: We evaluated seedling performance and cost-effectiveness under three novel soil amendments: nutrient-rich [...]