CWM and Rao’s quadratic diversity: a unified framework for functional ecology

Assessing the effects of environmental constraints on community structure often relies on methods that consider changes in species functional traits in response to environmental processes. Various indices have been proposed to measure relevant aspects of community trait composition from different viewpoints and perspectives. Among these, the ‘community-weighted mean trait value’ (CWM) and the Rao coefficient have been widely used in ecological research for summarizing different facets of functional composition and diversity. Analyzing changes in functional diversity of bee communities along a post-fire successional gradient in southern Switzerland we show that these two measures may be used to describe two complementary aspects of community structure, such as the mean and the dispersion of functional traits within a given species assemblage. While CWM can be adequately used to summarize shifts in mean trait values within communities due to environmental selection for certain functional traits, the Rao coefficient can be effectively applied to analyze patterns of trait convergence or divergence compared to a random expectation.     

What is the value of wild animal welfare for restoration ecology?

The restoration community continues to discuss what constitutes good environmental stewardship. One area of tension is the extent to which the well‐being of wild animals should inform restoration efforts. We discuss three ways that the perspective of wild animal welfare can augment restoration ecology: strengthening people's relationship with nature, reinforcing biotic integrity, and reducing mechanistic uncertainty. The animal welfare movement elevates sentient animals as stakeholders and explores how environmental context directly impacts the well‐being of individuals. Viewing wild animals through this lens may encourage people to think and act with empathy and altruism. Second, we incorporate animal welfare into the concept of biotic integrity for ecological and ethical reasons. Restoring ecosystem processes may enhance animal welfare, and vice versa. Alternatively, there may be a trade‐off between these factors, requiring local decision‐makers to prioritize between restoring ecosystem function and promoting individuals' well‐being. We conclude by discussing how welfare can impact population recovery, thereby adding insights about mechanisms underpinning restoration objectives. Ultimately, restoration ecologists and proponents of wild animal welfare could enjoy a productive union.     

Tools for living—A personal view of new status for aids for the disabled in society

Tools for Living is a concept which regards a technical aid for a disabled individual as being no different in principle from a tool which allows a normal individual to carry out a task for which his intrinsic biological equipment is inadequate.Acceptance of this concept would change the status, mechanism for provision and attitude towards technical aids, in a direction which would lower the barriers against personal acceptance, particularly in the elderly. It is forecast that the production of ‘tools’ specifically devised to compensate for the performance decrements in the elderly could become an important new branch of industry.     

Genetic diversity,distributional barriers and rafting continents — more thoughts on the evolution of mangroves

Without continental drift, the diversity and distribution of many species, including mangrove plants, would be very different today. First, there would be fewer pantropic genera and many more endemics. Second, their characteristics would not be as common and widespread as some are today. Continental drift has brought about the massive mixing and dispersal of genes in geologically recent times, greatly enhancing the evolutionary process; particularly for flowering plants — the angiosperms, which evolved during the period.Mangrove plants are comprised of approximately 70 species from 20 quite different angiosperm families. Most taxa are characterized by special physiological abilities and structural forms, enabling them to live in both seasonally fluctuating saline conditions, and water-saturated soils. Their occurrence is mostly tropical, perhaps because of harsh physiological conditions of intertidal habitats; but distributions of specific taxa do not fully concur with the idea of a completely tropical evolution, at least for some important species.At least one genus of mangrove tree, Avicennia, occurs around the world, chiefly in tropical estuarine habitats, although they also range into temperate latitudes, especially in the south. Around the world, there are no more than ten species of Avicennia recognised today, but their diagnostic determinants were inadequate prior to recent studies using both numerical analyses of morphological parameters and isozymes. Such analyses significantly reduced the number of apparent species, notably around Australia, and provided a basis for the revision of distributional records throughout the Indo West Pacific region. One species, A. marina, was found to be widespread and morphologically variable with genes divided into characteristic groupings of at least three geographic areas in the region. Based on these findings, there are several novel inferences to be made regarding the evolution of this genus. A western Gondwanan origin is proposed, with subsequent radiation of several taxa facilitated via the tectonic dispersal of southern continental fragments.     

Diagnostic testing for vaccinomics: is the regulatory approval framework adequate? A comparison of Canada, the United States, and Europe

Vaccinomics aims to integrate variability information from multiple levels of the biological hierarchy from genome to proteome to metabolome, and ways in which these biological parts interact with each other and the environment. Vaccinomics holds significant promise as a new public health tool in designing safer and more effective vaccines for both developed and developing countries. Vaccinomics tests that are envisioned to be used in tandem with vaccine-based health interventions could permit an informed forecast of individual and subpopulation variations in immune responses to vaccines, reduce adverse effects, and contribute to a foundation for rational and directed use of vaccines. A proactive, multidisciplinary engagement with vaccinomics is now timely and much needed in order to develop regulations that best ensure the protection of the public and promote the transition of vaccinomics innovations from discovery to real-life public health applications. This article examines and compares the regulatory oversight of vaccinomics tests in Canada, the United States, and Europe. Recent trends in these jurisdictions suggest that regulatory agencies view personalized genomics/omics medicine, such as vaccinomics, as a desirable goal. At the same time, proposals to increase oversight could impact progress in the field and affect the availability of vaccinomics tests in public health practice and the diagnostic test market. The comparative analysis of vaccinomics in three jurisdictions presented in this article highlights both the convergence and divergence of regulatory oversight. In a rapidly emerging field such as vaccinomics that is pivotal for global public health, achieving better harmonization of policies may be an advantageous target, while ensuring that symmetry exists between the goals of public safety and promoting public health innovation. We suggest it is now timely to proactively initiate a constructive dialogue among all stakeholders (publics, policymakers, researchers, private sector, governments) to foster the development of appropriately targeted regulatory policies in this field.     

A non-invasive faecal survey for the study of spatial ecology and kinship of solitary felids in the Viruá National Park,Amazon Basin

Jaguars and pumas are the largest felids in the Americas. Information about these two species is scarce, especially where both species are sympatric. We studied the use and selection of macrohabitats, spatial segregation and kinship in jaguars and pumas in the Viruá National Park (Amazonian lowlands) by non-invasive genetic analyses of faecal samples. Seven different jaguars (six males and one female) and nine different pumas (five males and four females) were identified. We found space use segregation between the two species, with pumas using mostly forested habitats and jaguars using open habitats slightly more than the forested ones. This result is unexpected, since previous studies have found that pumas favour more open habitats than jaguars. The results suggest that jaguars use the areas in a more random manner, corresponding to the habits of a dominant generalist species, whereas pumas use the area to reduce encounter rates with jaguars. Nevertheless, both species mainly used areas near upland forest-flooding habitats. Some kinship categories were supported with a p < 0.05 in 57 and 83% of the pair comparisons between the identified jaguars and the identified pumas, respectively. Non-invasive genetic analysis of faeces was useful to study the spatial ecology of solitary, rare and cryptic species in the Amazon.     

The Collothecidae (Rotifera,Collothecacea) of Thailand,with the description of a new species and an?illustrated key to the Southeast Asian fauna

Following previous reports indicating a remarkable high diversity of sessile rotifers in Southeast Asian freshwaters, we report on an extensive study of the diversity of Collothecidae rotifers from fifteen freshwater habitats in Thailand. A total of 13 species, including two additional infraspecific variants, of Collothecidae are recorded, one of which is described as a new species of Collotheca. We further add taxonomic remarks on some of the taxa on record and illustrate the uncinate trophi of several representatives by scanning electron microscopic images. Finally, we provide illustrated identification keys to the Collothecidae recorded to date from Southeast Asia.     

A smörgåsbord of markers for avian ecology and evolution

The polymerase chain reaction has been a boon to the study of molecular ecology and population genetics of birds. But the nagging truth is that for many bird species, the number of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) primer pairs that one can pick off the shelf and expect to amplify their target loci with ease is frustratingly small. Now, studying DNA sequence variation in natural populations of birds just got a whole lot easier. This issue of Molecular Ecology reports a large-scale bioinformatics search for exonic sequences conserved between the chicken and zebra finch genomes and flanking polymorphic introns that has generated a staggering 242 PCR primer pairs that readily amplify their single-copy target loci in five avian species spanning ~100 million years of avian evolution ( Backström et al . 2008 ). As proof of principle, these primers have also been used to survey the genomic landscape in over 110 kb of intronic sequence in the collared flycatcher, a model species in ecology and evolution. These resources pave the way for easy multilocus study of evolving populations and lineages of birds, and bring the goal of quickly turning nonmodel species in to ecological genomic models tantalizingly close.     

惠州西湖游浮植物群落对生态系统修复的响应

2004年对广东惠州西湖实施了生态系统修复示范工程,示范区目前沉水植物丰富,水体常年清澈见底。通过2008年6月至2009年5月对示范区和未进行生态修复的平湖逐月进行浮游植物调查,研究了浮游植物群落对湖泊生态系统修复的响应。结果表明,与未修复的平湖相比,示范区浮游植物数量及群落结构均发生了很大变化。示范区全年浮游植物平均生物量和细胞丰度分别为0.31 mg/L和2.75×106cells/L,均远低于未修复的平湖的3.27 mg/L和197.46×106cells/L;平湖中蓝藻在全年大部分时间占有绝对优势,一些热带富营养化水体中的代表种类（假鱼腥藻）成为优势种类;而示范区蓝藻不占优势,取而代之的是一些隐藻、硅藻和甲藻门的种类。另外,示范区浮游植物丰富度增加,年平均Margalef物种丰富度指数为3.70,显著高于平湖的2.68。因此,重建以沉水生植物为优势的生态系统是抑制浮游植物发展和改善湖泊水环境的有效途径。     

Indicating ecosystem and landscape organisation

This paper presents a brief outline of the theoretical and conceptual fundamentals for the derivation of an ecosystem oriented indicator system to demonstrate the state of ecological entities on a holistic basis. There are two branches of argumentation: on a normative level, the sustainability principle is interpreted from an anthropocentric point-of-view; sustainability in this context means to provide ecosystem services on a broad scale and a long-term basis, including the attempt to avoid unspecific ecological risks. A second line-of-argumentation bases on the principles of ecosystem analysis and the theory of ecological orientation. Consequently, the aspired indicandum is the self-organising capacity of ecosystems, and the indicator sets represents an aggregate of structural and functional ecosystem features in a developing environment. The indicator set is demonstrated by one case study from the Bornhoeved Lakes ecosystem research project.     

生态系统原理与可持续农业

论述了农业生态系统的能量流动物质循环原理、系统相关原理、相生相克原理、忍耐极限原理、结构功能原理、系统开放原理、限制因子原理、非加和原理、生物竞争原理和竞争排斥原理 ;认为中国生态农业是一种较为典型的可持续发展的农业系统类型 ,建议在国家持续农业发展进程中要积极推行生态农业 .     

喀斯特槽谷区生态退化与修复专题导读

在国家重点研发计划项目——\"喀斯特槽谷区土地石漠化过程及综合治理技术研发与示范(2016YFC0502300)\"的支持下,经过项目组全体成员三年的共同努力,在喀斯特槽谷区生态退化与修复方面取得了一些重要进展。主要有:(1)2000—2015年槽谷区土壤侵蚀总量逐年减少,年平均侵蚀模数逐年降低,槽谷区植被覆盖明显提高;(2)拉巴豆地埂篱根土复合体不仅能有效提高喀斯特土壤的粒径大小和增强土体的抗剪/冲性能,并且能够利用大气N_2合成植物生长所需的氮肥,从而提高土壤肥力,可望实现石漠化治理中生态效应和经济效应的双赢;(3)喀斯特槽谷区隧道建设改变了地下水流场并降低了地下水位,进而降低了土壤微生物丰度和多样性,而增加了适应干旱的微生物种群,并导致土壤质量的降低;隧道建设加速了坡面产流和土壤流失,加剧了土地石漠化,从而导致生态退化;(4)随着槽谷区退化生态系统的恢复,生态系统的生态服务功能得到提升。     

红树林生态系统服务功能研究综述

红树林湿地是热带亚热带地区陆地生态系统向海洋生态系统过渡的重要生态系统,具有重要的生态环境服务功能。由于其特殊的生态功能和较高的经济、社会价值,近年来成为湿地生态学研究的热点。本文对红树林生态系统在生产有机物、维持热带亚热带河口生态系统、降低风速以及海水流速、防治和减轻灾难、截留碎屑形成陆地、保护海堤、吸附污染物净化水体、提供多种生境、维护生物多样性,以及形成优美的环境开展生态旅游等几个方面的生态服务功能进行了综述,旨在为红树林资源的保护与合理利用提供参考。同时指出,对红树林的上述生态服务功能的内在生态学过程与效应及其价值评估尚需要开展更深入的研究。     

Ecotourism and ecological restoration

The fast pace of tourism development around the world is causing untold damage to some of the most endangered ecological systems. From Dubai to Honolulu and from Cancun to Beijing, the environmental impacts of tourism are alarming. Ecological restoration (ER) of disturbed lands should be an important approach to sensitive tourism planning. This paper addresses the need for restoring biodiversity and how ecotourism has shown to be a strong force in the field of ER. Two examples (one each of private and community based ecotourism) incorporating ER will be highlighted in this paper: Phinda Game Reserve, South Africa and the Baboon Sanctuary in Belize. We call for greater dialogue across disciplines, notably ER, conservation science and ecotourism.     

Ecological restoration: A new frontier for nature conservation and economics

Ecological restoration is still perceived by many conservationists, and the majority of economists, as a diversion, a delusion, and – far worse – a waste of money. In this paper we point out that restoration is in fact complementary not only to nature conservation but also to sustainable, equitable socio-economic development. This is because restoring and augmenting the natural capital base generates jobs and improves livelihoods and the quality of life of all in the economy.

In developing countries, where most biodiversity hotspots occur, both conservation of nature and the restoration of degraded ecosystems will find local support only if they are clearly linked to socio-economic development. Conversely, sound socio-economic development in the environmentally damaged portions of those countries undoubtedly will require ecological restoration of the natural capital base. Nature conservation, ecological restoration, and sustainable economic development policies should therefore be planned, budgeted and executed conjointly.