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98 news posts in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

Environment

23 Sep 2021

Bat guts become less healthy through diet of ‘fast food’ from banana plantations

By Tania Fitzgeorge-Balfour, science writer Pallas’s long-tongued bat (Glossophaga soricina) feeding on banana flowers. Image credit: Julian Schneider New research reveals there is a stark difference between the gut bacteria of nectar-feeding bats foraging in conventional monoculture banana plantations and those bats who forage in their natural forest habitat or organic plantations. This is the first study to show an association between habitat alteration, sustainable agriculture and the gut microbiota of wildlife. Nectar-feeding bats foraging in intensively managed banana plantations in Costa Rica have a less diverse set of gut microbes in comparison to bats feeding in their natural forest habitat or organic plantations, reveals new research published today in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. This the first study to show an association between habitat alteration, sustainable agriculture and the gut microbiota of wildlife. “Organic and conventional monoculture banana plantations both provide a very reliable food source for some nectar-feeding bat species. However, bats foraging in the intensively managed plantations had a reduced diversity of gut microbes, which could be a sign of gut dysbiosis, an unhealthy imbalance of its microbial symbionts,” explains Priscilla Alpízar, first author of this study, a doctoral student at the Institute of Evolutionary Ecology and […]

Featured news

16 Sep 2021

Scientists pretend to be Neanderthals to explore how they caught birds in caves for food

By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Image credit: Gorodenkoff / Shutterstock.com From fossil evidence and through scientific role-play, researchers reconstruct that Neanderthals probably used fire and tools to dazzle, corral, and catch choughs, communally roosting birds, inside caves at night. The choughs would not only have contributed welcome calories and micronutrients to the Neanderthals’ diet, but may also have yielded elements for their personal decoration. Neanderthals, our closest relatives, became extinct between 40,000 to 35,000 years ago. Since the discovery of the first Neanderthal fossil 165 years ago, scientists have learned more about Neanderthals – including their culture, sociality, ecology, diet, control of fire, production and use of tools, physiology, and even their genomic code – than about any other non-human hominin. Here, Spanish researchers use a highly original approach – scientific “role play” – to reconstruct a likely novel element of Neanderthal behavior: cooperating with group members while using fire and tools to catch choughs, birds from the crow family, from their night roosts inside caves. Their findings are published in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. Neanderthals are known to have eaten plants, fungi, shellfish, roasted pinecones, and flesh from stranded dolphins. At the same time, they were important […]

Earth science

16 Aug 2021

Secret to speediness of ancient bipedal reptile has been revealed

By Clarissa Wright, Frontiers science writer Close-up of a reptile eye, but not the ancient Eudibamus cursoris. Image Aedka Studio/Shutterstock.com The Early Permian marked a time of major seasonal changes on the planet, as reptiles rapidly diversified. A key innovation is seen in bolosaurids with the ability to run at high speeds on two legs. Scientists from California State University and Carnegie Museum of Natural History in the US and University of Toronto Mississauga, Canada, collaborated in a study recently published to Frontiers presenting the first comprehensive description of the earliest known bipedal reptile from the Early Permian – a type of bolosaurid called Eudibamus cursoris. For the first time, its unique style of locomotion that achieved high running speeds on two legs has been revealed. The Permian period (between 298.9m and 252.2m years ago) was the last period of the Paleozoic Era. The Earth was warming out of an ice age, while weather intensified. Remnants of carboniferous rainforests disappeared, replaced by open desert. Facing these environmental changes, reptiles rapidly diversified and showed remarkable innovations during the Permian. Bolosaurids are the oldest family belonging to the ancient group of extinct reptiles known as Parareptilla (or parareptiles), and are considered a […]

Climate action

05 May 2021

Majority of bird species in Americas could survive climate change, shows study

By Robert Hanley / Durham University communications team The Arenal Volcano seen from the Monteverde Cloud Forest. Monteverde-Arenal is one of 21 Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBA) in Costa Rica. Credit: Sorin Vacaru Photography / Shutterstock.com Researchers show that the current network of Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs) across the Americas should remain able to house the majority of bird species of conservation concern even after climate change. While individual bird species may shift their distribution range, 73% of species of conservation concern are likely to persist in at least half of the IBAs in which they occur, and 90% of species in at least a quarter of their current IBAs. This implies that future conservation efforts in the Caribbean and Central and South America can focus on expanding the current IBA network. A new study, led by Durham University and published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, investigates the impacts of potential climate change scenarios on the network of Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs) across the Caribbean, and Central and South America. The research was carried out in collaboration with Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre, BirdLife International and the National Audubon Society. IBAs are […]

Featured news

26 Feb 2021

Improving water quality could help conserve insectivorous birds — study

Scarcity of insect prey in disturbed lakes and streams contributes to bird decline, show new results By Anna Sigurdsson and Mischa Dijkstra, science writers A new study shows for the first time that the alarming decline in insectivorous birds across the US may be due to a decline of emergent insects in lakes and streams with poor water quality. These findings highlight the need for holistic conservation across terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Western wood-pepee, Contopus sordidulus. Image: vagabond54/Shutterstock A new study shows that a widespread decline in abundance of emergent insects – whose immature stages develop in lakes and streams while the adults live on land – can help to explain the alarming decline in abundance and diversity of aerial insectivorous birds (ie preying on flying insects) across the US. In turn, the decline in emergent insects appears to be driven by human disturbance and pollution of water bodies, especially in streams. This study, published in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, is one of the first to find evidence for a causal link between the decline of insectivorous birds, the decline of emergent aquatic insects, and poor water quality. Human activities, such as urbanization and agriculture, have adverse effects on […]

Earth science

10 Feb 2021

Scientists propose three-step method to reverse significant reforestation side effect

By Colm Gorey, Frontiers science writer Image: Farid Suhaimi/Shutterstock Reforestation efforts using a monoculture of a fast-growing tree species, while effective, significantly impact the soil water content of humid, tropical regions and threatens global freshwater supplies. Scientists have now found that the transpiration rate and transpiration-related trait values are up to 10 times greater in the fast-growing species than nearby, dominant slow-growing species. The team has proposed a three-step method for ensuring reforestation efforts in tropical regions don’t harm the surrounding soil water content. ► Read original article► Download original article (pdf) While deforestation levels have decreased significantly since the turn of the 21st century, the United Nations (UN) estimates that 10 million hectares of trees have been felled in each of the last five years. Aside from their vital role in absorbing CO2 from the air, forests play an integral part in maintaining the delicate ecosystems that cover our planet. Efforts are now underway across the world to rectify the mistakes of the past, with the UN Strategic Plan for Forests setting out the objective for an increase in global forest coverage by 3% by 2030. With time being of the essence, one of the most popular methods of reforestation in […]