Helge Bruelheide, Jürgen Dengler, Oliver Purschke, Jonathan Lenoir et al.
Plant functional traits directly affect ecosystem functions. At the species level, trait combinations depend on trade-offs representing different ecological strategies, but at the community level trait combinations are expected to be decoupled from these trade-offs because different strategies can f...
Emily Beech, Malin Rivers, Sara Oldfield, Paul Smith
This article presents, for the first time, an overview of all known tree species by scientific name and country level distribution, and describes an online database—GlobalTreeSearch—that provides access to this information. Based on our comprehensive analysis of published data sources and expert inp...
Cindy Q. Tang, Tetsuya Matsui, Haruka Ohashi, Yi-Fei Dong et al.
Today East Asia harbors many "relict" plant species whose ranges were much larger during the Paleogene-Neogene and earlier. The ecological and climatic conditions suitable for these relict species have not been identified. Here, we map the abundance and distribution patterns of relict species, showi...
H. Reşi̇t Akçakaya, Elizabeth L. Bennett, Thomas M. Brooks, Molly K. Grace et al.
Stopping declines in biodiversity is critically important, but it is only a first step toward achieving more ambitious conservation goals. The absence of an objective and practical definition of species recovery that is applicable across taxonomic groups leads to inconsistent targets in recovery pla...
Patricia Gibert, B. Moréteau, Georges Pétavy, Dev Karan et al.
Most drosophilid species can be classified either as temperate or tropical. Adults of species were submitted to a cold treatment (0 degrees C) and then brought back to ambient temperature. They generally exhibited a chill coma and the time needed to recover was measured. We found in a set of 26 temp...
Yuanye Zhang, Da‐Yong Zhang, Spencer C. H. Barrett
Aquatic plant invasions are often associated with long-distance dispersal of vegetative propagules and prolific clonal reproduction. These reproductive features combined with genetic bottlenecks have the potential to severely limit genetic diversity in invasive populations. To investigate this quest...
Mohammad Golam Mostofa, Weiqiang Li, Kien Huu Nguyen, Masayuki Fujita et al.
Phytohormones play central roles in boosting plant tolerance to environmental stresses, which negatively affect plant productivity and threaten future food security. Strigolactones (SLs), a class of carotenoid-derived phytohormones, were initially discovered as an "ecological signal" for parasitic s...
Francesco María Sabatini, Borja Jiménez‐Alfaro, Ute Jandt, Milan Chytrý et al.
Global patterns of regional (gamma) plant diversity are relatively well known, but whether these patterns hold for local communities, and the dependence on spatial grain, remain controversial. Using data on 170,272 georeferenced local plant assemblages, we created global maps of alpha diversity (loc...
Helen E. Roy, Aníbal Pauchard, Peter Stoett, Tanara Renard Truong et al.
Although invasive alien species have long been recognized as a major threat to nature and people, until now there has been no comprehensive global review of the status, trends, drivers, impacts, management and governance challenges of biological invasions. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platfo...
Oddmund Kleven, Terje Laskemoen, Frode Fossøy, Raleigh J. Robertson et al.
Spermatozoa are among the most diversified cells in the animal kingdom, but the underlying evolutionary forces affecting intraspecific variation in sperm morphology are poorly understood. It has been hypothesized that sperm competition is a potent selection pressure on sperm variation within species...
MM Hossain, Ravi Kant, Pham Thanh Van, Budi Wınarto et al.
This review provides an informative and broad overview of orchid biotechnology, addressing several important aspects such as molecular systematics, modern breeding, in vitro morphogenesis, protoplast culture, flowering control, flower color, somaclonal variation, orchid mycorrhiza, pathogen resistan...
Kayri Havens, Pati Vitt, Mike Maunder, Edward O. Guerrant et al.
Abstract In recent years, the mission of many botanic gardens and arboreta has expanded from a traditional focus on developing a horticultural collection to one that includes taking a proactive role in plant conservation. To use their limited resources more effectively, many gardens are seeking ways...
Kizar Ahmed Sumon, Afifat Khanam Ritika, E.T.H.M. Peeters, Harunur Rashid et al.
The neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid is used in Bangladesh for a variety of crop protection purposes. Imidacloprid may contaminate aquatic ecosystems via spray drift, surface runoff and ground water leaching. The present study aimed at assessing the fate and effects of imidacloprid on structur...
Eugenie Regan, Luca Santini, Lisa Ingwall‐King, Michael Hoffmann et al.
Abstract Biodiversity is declining, with direct and indirect effects on ecosystem functions and services that are poorly quantified. Here, we develop the first global assessment of trends in pollinators, focusing on pollinating birds and mammals. A Red List Index for these species shows that, overal...
Paul R. Martin, Robert Montgomerie, Stephen C. Lougheed
Latitudinal variation in patterns of evolution has fascinated biologists for over a century, but our understanding of latitudinal differences in evolutionary processes-such as selection and drift-remains limited. Here, we test for, and find, accelerated evolution of color patterns in bird taxa that ...