Preprints
There are 1657 Preprints listed.
Methods for testing publication bias in ecological and evolutionary meta-analyses
Published: 2021-04-08
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
1. Publication bias threatens the validity of quantitative evidence from meta-analyses as it results in some findings being overrepresented in meta-analytic datasets because they are published more frequently or sooner (e.g., ‘positive’ results). Unfortunately, methods to test for the presence of publication bias, or assess its impact on meta-analytic results, are unsuitable for datasets with [...]
BetaBayes - A Bayesian approach for comparing ecological communities
Published: 2021-04-08
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Statistics and Probability
Ecological communities change due to both natural and human factors. Distinguishing between the two is critical to ecology and conservation science. One of the most common approaches for modelling species composition changes is calculating Beta diversity indices and then relating index changes to covariates changes. The main difficulty with these analyses is that Beta diversity indices are paired [...]
Fungus-bacterium associations are widespread in fungal cultures isolated from a semi-arid natural grassland in Germany
Published: 2021-04-06
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
We here report on a study that aimed at establishing a large soil-fungal culture collection spanning a wide taxonomic diversity and systematically screening the collection for bacterial associations.
Ecological mechanisms underlying aridity thresholds in global drylands
Published: 2021-04-01
Subjects: Desert Ecology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
With ongoing climate change, the probability of crossing environmental thresholds promoting abrupt changes in ecosystem structure and functioning is higher than ever. In drylands (sites where it rains less than 60% of what is evaporated), recent research has shown how the crossing of three particular aridity thresholds (defining three consecutive phases, namely vegetation decline, soil disruption [...]
Astatotilapia species (Teleostei, Cichlidae) from Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania, excluding the basin of Lake Victoria.
Published: 2021-04-01
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
The haplochromine cichlid fauna of the rivers and smaller lakes of Tanzania and SE Africa are of key importance in understanding the origins and inter-relationships of the great lake cichlid radiations of Malawi, Tanganyika and Victoria. Prior to formal taxonomic investigations, here we present the results of investigations of the type specimens, identification of type localities and superficial [...]
Supporting actionable science for environmental policy: Advice for funding agencies from decision makers
Published: 2021-04-01
Subjects: Environmental Policy, Environmental Studies, Life Sciences, Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Successful incorporation of scientific knowledge into environmental policy and decisions is a significant challenge. Although studies on how to bridge the knowledge-action gap have grown rapidly over the last decade, few have investigated the roles, responsibilities, and opportunities for funding bodies to meet this challenge. In this study we present a set of criteria gleaned from interviews [...]
Applying the FEW nexus concept at the local scale
Published: 2021-04-01
Subjects: Civil and Environmental Engineering, Engineering, Environmental Studies, Social and Behavioral Sciences
The food-energy-water (FEW) nexus describes interactions among domains that yield gains or tradeoffs when analyzed together rather than independently. In a project about renewable energy in rural Alaska communities, we applied this concept to examine the implications for sustainability and resilience. The FEW nexus provided a useful framework for identifying the cross-domain benefits of renewable [...]
Contrasting climate velocity impacts in warm and cool locations show that effects of marine warming are worse in already warmer temperate waters
Published: 2021-03-31
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Population Biology, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Species responses to climate change are often measured at broad spatiotemporal scales, which can miss fine-scale changes that are relevant to conservation and fisheries management. We develop a scale-able geostatistical approach to assess how juvenile and adult fish distributions have been shaped by changes in bottom temperature and dissolved oxygen over a recent decade of warming in the [...]
Forest Conservation in Madagascar: Past, Present, Future
Published: 2021-03-31
Subjects: Biodiversity, Life Sciences
To be published in the upcoming book The New Natural History of Madagascar, edited by S. M. Goodman, published by Princeton University Press. A French translation of the chapter "Conservation des forêts à Madagascar : Passé, Présent, et Futur" is included at the end of the preprint. At this critical time for the future of Madagascar’s biodiversity, we first review the past: touching upon [...]
Global economic and diet transitions drove Latin American and Caribbean forest change during the first decade of the century.
Published: 2021-03-31
Subjects: Arts and Humanities, Environmental Sciences, Geography, Life Sciences, Natural Resources and Conservation, Physical and Environmental Geography, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) contain more tropical high-biodiversity forest than the remaining areas of the planet combined, yet experienced more than a third of global deforestation during the first decade of the 21st century. While drivers of forest change occur at multiple scales, we examined forest change at the municipal and national scales integrated with global processes such as [...]
Hutchinsons ecological niche for individuals
Published: 2021-03-31
Subjects: Animal Studies, Environmental Studies, Social and Behavioral Sciences
We here develop a concept of an individualized niche in analogy to Hutchison’s population-level concept of the ecological niche. We consider the individualized (ecological) niche as the range of environmental conditions under which a particular individual has expected lifetime reproductive success of ≥1. Our concept is essentially ecological primarily in the sense of fit of individual phenotypes [...]
Oropendola nest predation and rodent consumption by the black-capped capuchin (Sapajus apella) in the Manu Biosphere Reserve, Peru
Published: 2021-03-26
Subjects: Environmental Sciences, Natural Resources and Conservation, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The Neotropical primate Sapajus apella (Linnaeus, 1758), the black-capped capuchin monkey, is widely distributed across the Amazon basin (Boubli et al., 2020). Capuchins are generalist platyrrhines, occurring in most tropical forest types, where they forage opportunistically (Sabbatini et al., 2008; Lynch Alfaro et al., 2012; Boubli et al., 2020). They exploit a diverse variety of food sources, [...]
Weak but persistent provenance effects modulate the response of Quercus robur (Fagaceae) seedlings to elevated temperature
Published: 2021-03-25
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology
Background and aims Clinal variation in bud phenology and growth has repeatedly been reported in common garden experiments for many tree species. The response of the seedlings generated from such translocated trees has not been studied yet, despite its relevance regarding the role of transgenerational plasticity in the adaptation of long-living trees in the face of climate change. Here, we aim to [...]
Effects of wave-driven water flow on the fast-start escape response of juvenile coral reef damselfishes
Published: 2021-03-25
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences
Fish often evade predators with a fast-start escape response. Studies typically examine this behaviour in still water despite water motion being an inherent feature of aquatic ecosystems. In shallow habitats, waves create complex flows that likely influence escape performance, particularly in small fishes with low absolute swimming speeds relative to environmental flows. I examined how [...]
Applying conservation reserve design strategies to define ecosystem monitoring priorities
Published: 2021-03-24
Subjects: Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences
In an era of unprecedented ecological upheaval, accurately monitoring ecosystem change at large spatial scales and over long-time frames is an essential to effective environmental management and conservation. However, economic limitations often preclude revisiting entire monitoring networks at a high enough frequency to accurately detect ecological changes. Thus, a prioritisation strategy is [...]