On the dimensionality of ecological stability

Ecological stability is touted as a complex and multifaceted concept, including components such as variability, resistance, resilience, persistence and robustness. Even though a complete appreciation of the effects of perturbations on ecosystems requires the simultaneous measurement of these multiple components of stability, most ecological research has focused on one or a few of those components analysed in isolation. Here, we present a new view of ecological stability that recognises explicitly the non‐independence of components of stability. This provides an approach for simplifying the concept of stability. We illustrate the concept and approach using results from a field experiment, and show that the effective dimensionality of ecological stability is considerably lower than if the various components of stability were unrelated. However, strong perturbations can modify, and even decouple, relationships among individual components of stability. Thus, perturbations not only increase the dimensionality of stability but they can also alter the relationships among components of stability in different ways. Studies that focus on single forms of stability in isolation therefore risk underestimating significantly the potential of perturbations to destabilise ecosystems. In contrast, application of the multidimensional stability framework that we propose gives a far richer understanding of how communities respond to perturbations.     

生态系统质量及其状态演变的生态学理论和评估方法之探索

生态文明建设和生态环境治理是国家治理的基本任务之一,我国已经明确提出了提升生态系统质量和稳定性的目标。然而,生态系统质量的科学概念及其状态演变的评估理论和方法却是一直困扰学术界且尚未形成广泛共识的难题。本文在梳理生态系统质量的科学概念及其状态演变研究进展基础上,借鉴物质生产的产品质量、质量管理和质量评价概念,论述了生态系统质量概念及生态学理论基础,从生态系统的自然属性-社会属性-经济属性及其相互关系,生态系统组分-结构-过程-功能-服务-功效的级联关系,系统要素-系统-环境互馈关系,以及生态系统的状态波动-数量变化-质量改变的逻辑关系等视角,讨论了生态系统质量及演变的科学内涵,进而从自然资源环境系统、典型生态系统、区域宏观生态系统、生态工程效应/功效等方面,提出了多应用目标的生态系统质量变化评估的视角和方法。     

蛋白质多态现象的研究及其应用

蛋白质多态现象是生物界比较普遍的现象,有其深刻的生物学意义。蛋白质多态现象的研究是从Smithies(1955)以淀粉凝胶为载体电泳分离血清蛋白、乳蛋白以及蛋清蛋白的成功才得以发展的。     

恢复生态学焦点问题

就恢复生态学的概念、近期的发展趋势与前沿命题、传统生态学理论在生态恢复过程中的应用及恢复生态学的社会性等核心问题展开论述。恢复生态学是一门年轻的学科,迄今尚无统一的定义。代表性的有3方面的学术观点。第1种强调受损的生态系统要恢复到理想的状态;第2种强调其应用生态学过程;第3种强调生态整合性恢复。笔者认为,恢复生态学是研究生态系统退化的原因、退化生态系统恢复与重建的技术与方法、过程与机理的科学。从近年的国际恢复生态学大会来看,恢复生态学研究近期主要有3个方面的发展趋势。一是强调自然恢复与社会、人文的耦合。认为恢复生态是全球性的,不只是自然的过程,应有全社会的支持,包括政治、经济和人文的介入。二是强调无论是在地域上还是在理论上都要跨越边界。有效的生态恢复实践在地域上要求多地区甚至是多国家的合作,在理论上要求多学科的交叉与耦合。三是强调以生态系统为基点,在景观尺度表达。随着环境和经济问题的全球化,生态系统和景观尺度的恢复生态学研究引起了越来越多的关注。2004年第15届国际恢复生态学大会的会议主题已定为：恢复、景观与设计。在当前研究趋势的基础上,提出了恢复生态学当前研究的6个前沿命题：恢复生态学的学科理论框架研究、恢复生态系统的功益研究、生物多样性在生态恢复中的作用研究、生态恢复对全球变化的响应研究、生态恢复立法研究和生态恢复与社会、经济的整合性研究。退化生态系统的恢复与重建是一项十分复杂的系统工程,尤其需要生态学理论的指导。多数生态学理论已被应用于恢复生态学的研究与实践。结合实例,着重阐述了生态系统演替理论在生态恢复中的应用。恢复生态与全球变化间的相互作用研究越来越多的引起了人们的关注,但多数研究仍停滞在定性研究阶段。在广东的恢复生态学研究表明,广东省从1986年至1998年,植被覆盖从26％到51％,新造林绿化的植被每年可吸收、固定广东省年排放CO2量的一半。人类社会与自然环境的协调可持续发展,不仅要求实现生态环境的可持续,同时亦要求实现人类社会与经济的可持续发展。这就要求生态系统的恢复与重建必须同时实现生态、经济与社会效率的三重优化。中国科学院华南植物研究所生态中心在中国热带、南亚热带进行的退化生态系统的恢复与重建研究历时30余年,所产生的显著的经济和社会效益,在各个实验站点均已有所反映。     

Seasonal variation of secondary metabolites in nine different bryophytes

Bryophytes occur in almost all land ecosystems and contribute to global biogeochemical cycles, ecosystem functioning, and influence vegetation dynamics. As growth and biochemistry of bryophytes are strongly dependent on the season, we analyzed metabolic variation across seasons with regard to ecological characteristics and phylogeny. Using bioinformatics methods, we present an integrative and reproducible approach to connect ecology with biochemistry. Nine different bryophyte species were collected in three composite samples in four seasons. Untargeted liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (LC/MS) was performed to obtain metabolite profiles. Redundancy analysis, Pearson's correlation, Shannon diversity, and hierarchical clustering were used to determine relationships among species, seasons, ecological characteristics, and hierarchical clustering. Metabolite profiles of Marchantia polymorpha and Fissidens taxifolius which are species with ruderal life strategy (R‐selected) showed low seasonal variability, while the profiles of the pleurocarpous mosses and Grimmia pulvinata which have characteristics of a competitive strategy (C‐selected) were more variable. Polytrichum strictum and Plagiomnium undulatum had intermediary life strategies. Our study revealed strong species‐specific differences in metabolite profiles between the seasons. Life strategies, growth forms, and indicator values for light and soil were among the most important ecological predictors. We demonstrate that untargeted Eco‐Metabolomics provide useful biochemical insight that improves our understanding of fundamental ecological strategies.     

Oxygen stable isotope ratios of tree-ring cellulose: the next phase of understanding

Analysis of the oxygen isotope ratio of tree-ring cellulose is a valuable tool that can be used as a paleoclimate proxy. Our ability to use this tool has gone through different phases. The first began in the 1970s with the demonstration of empirical relationships between the oxygen isotope ratio of tree-ring cellulose and climate. These empirical relationships, however, did not provide us with the confidence that they are robust through time, across taxa and across geographical locations. The second phase began with a rudimentary understanding of the physiological and biochemical mechanisms responsible for the oxygen isotope ratios of cellulose, which is necessary to increase the power of this tool. This phase culminated in a mechanistic tree-ring model integrating concepts of physiology and biochemistry in a whole-plant system. This model made several assumptions about leaf water isotopic enrichment and biochemistry which, in the nascent third phase, are now being challenged, with surprising results. These third-phase results suggest that, contrary to the model assumption, leaf temperature across a large latitudinal gradient is remarkably constant and does not follow ambient temperature. Recent findings also indicate that the biochemistry responsible for the incorporation of the cellulose oxygen isotopic signature is not as simple as has been assumed. Interestingly, the results of these challenges have strengthened the tree-ring model. There are several other assumptions that can be investigated which will improve the utility of the tree-ring model.     

Bacillus thuringiensis and Its Pesticidal Crystal Proteins

During the past decade the pesticidal bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis has been the subject of intensive research. These efforts have yielded considerable data about the complex relationships between the structure, mechanism of action, and genetics of the organism’s pesticidal crystal proteins, and a coherent picture of these relationships is beginning to emerge. Other studies have focused on the ecological role of the B. thuringiensis crystal proteins, their performance in agricultural and other natural settings, and the evolution of resistance mechanisms in target pests. Armed with this knowledge base and with the tools of modern biotechnology, researchers are now reporting promising results in engineering more-useful toxins and formulations, in creating transgenic plants that express pesticidal activity, and in constructing integrated management strategies to insure that these products are utilized with maximum efficiency and benefit.     

Ecological restoration should be redefined for the twenty‐first century

Forty years ago, ecological restoration was conceptualized through a natural science lens. Today, ecological restoration has evolved into a social and scientific concept. The duality of ecological restoration is acknowledged in guidance documents on the subject but is not apparent in its definition. Current definitions reflect our views about what ecological restoration does but not why we do it. This viewpoint does not give appropriate credit to contributions from social sciences, nor does it provide compelling goals for people with different motivating rationales to engage in or support restoration. In this study, I give a concise history of the conceptualization and definition of ecological restoration, and I propose an alternative definition and corresponding viewpoint on restoration goal‐setting to meet twenty‐first century scientific and public inquiry.     

生态交错带与生态流

生态交错带与生态流王庆锁（中国农业科学院畜牧研究所,北京１０００９４）冯宗炜罗菊春（中国科学院生态环境中心,１０００８０）（北京林业大学,１０００８３）ＥｃｏｔｏｎｅｓａｎｄＥｃｏｌｏｇｉｃａｌＦｌｏｗｓ．ＷａｎｇＱｉｎｇｓｕｏ（ＡｎｉｍａｌＨｕｓ...     

A tribute to sulfur.

Recent progress in a number of areas of biochemistry and biology has drawn attention to the critical importance of sulfur in the biosynthesis of vital cofactors and active sites in proteins, and in the complex reaction mechanisms often involved. This brief review is intended as a broad overview of this currently rapidly moving field of sulfur biochemistry, for those who are interested or are involved in one or the other aspect of it, a synopsis by one who has stumbled into this field from several directions in the course of time. Only for iron are metal-sulfur relationships discussed in detail, as the iron-sulfur subfield is one of the most active areas.     

Molecules are more than markers: new directions in molecular microbial ecology

Macromolecules such as DNA, RNA, and proteins are widely used to quantify diversity in natural communities, to monitor the dispersal of organisms and their genes, and to trace phylogenetic relationships among organisms. With such widespread use of molecules as markers, it is easy to forget that they perform functions that are integral to the survival of organisms. The structural and functional properties of macromolecules have been intensively studied in genetics, biochemistry, and physiology. These fields, however, have not generally focused on the ecological significance of molecular variation, but instead have used defective variants as tools for identifying structure and function. Understanding the significance of molecular variation for organismal success or failure is a central problem in ecology, one whose solution will require the integration of diverse approaches and perspectives from ecology, molecular biology, genetics, physiology, and evolutionary biology. I review several studies of bacterial populations evolving in simple environments that have begun to integrate these approaches and perspectives in order to examine the consequences of molecular variation for ecological performance.     

Resource heterogeneity, diet shifts and intra-cohort competition: effects on size divergence in YOY fish

The pollination syndrome hypothesis has provided a major conceptual framework for how plants and pollinators interact. However, the assumption of specialization in pollination systems and the reliability of floral traits in predicting the main pollinators have been questioned recently. In addition, the relationship between ecological and evolutionary specialization in pollination interactions is still poorly understood. We used data of 62 plant species from three communities across southern Norway to test: (1) the relationships between floral traits and the identity of pollinators, (2) the association between floral traits (evolutionary specialization) and ecological generalization, and (3) the consistency of both relationships across communities. Floral traits significantly affected the identity of pollinators in the three communities in a way consistent with the predictions derived from the pollination syndrome concept. However, hover flies and butterflies visited flowers with different shapes in different communities, which we mainly attribute to among-community variation in pollinator assemblages. Interestingly, ecological generalization depended more on the community-context (i.e. the plant and pollinator assemblages in the communities) than on specific floral traits. While open yellow and white flowers were the most generalist in two communities, they were the most specialist in the alpine community. Our results warn against the use of single measures of ecological generalization to question the pollination syndrome concept, and highlight the importance of community comparisons to assess the pollination syndromes, and to understand the relationships between ecological and evolutionary specialization in plant-pollinator interactions.     

Ecology,thermodynamics and H.T. Odum's conjectures

The central rôle of energy in all life processes has led to the development of numerous hypotheses, conjectures and theories on the relationships between thermodynamics and ecological processes. In this paper we examine the theoretical and empirical support for these developments, and in particular for the widely published set of thermodynamic conjectures developed by H.T. Odum, in which the maximum power principle is put forward as a generic feature of evolution in ecosystems. Although they are widely used, we argue that many of the ecological studies that have adopted the ideas encapsulated in Odum's work have done so without being aware of some of the fundamental problems underlying this approach. We discuss alternative ways in which a general available-work concept could be constructed for use as a numeraire in an energy-centered ecological theory or paradigm. In so doing, we examine what is meant by material accessibility and energy stocks and flows with respect to traditional food web and food chain theories, and relate these to results from the evolutionary dynamics of ecosystems. We conclude that the various forms and uses of energy bound up in essential ecosystem processes present a formidable obstacle to obtaining an operational definition of a general, aggregated available-work concept, a prerequisite for the systems approach of Odum and others. We also show that the prototypical derivations of the maximum power principle, and its interpretation, are contradicted on many scales both by empirical data and models, thereby invalidating the maximum power principle as a general principle of ecological evolution. The conclusions point to the fundamental problem of trying to describe ecosystems in a framework which has a one-dimensional currency.     

运用《生物化学》歌曲，辅助《生物化学》教学

《生物化学》以生物体为对象,研究其生命的化学本质,是生命科学领域的核心课程。长期以来,由于生物化学课程知识点多、范围广和内容抽象,在一定程度上会影响学生学习的自信心,压抑其学习过程中的兴趣,致使学习的积极性不高。最近10～20年里,国外将科学（science）、技术学（technology）、工程学（engineering）及数学（mathematics）的教育与艺术学（arts）,特别是与艺术学中的音乐结合实施教学,形成一种所谓的STEAM (STEM + Arts) 策略,对STEM教育进行辅助,取得了不错的效果。基于以上情况,结合国内生物化学教学实际,笔者尝试将生物化学歌曲应用于课堂教学过程中,辅助教学。生物化学歌曲可以将抽象难懂的生物化学知识转变成悦耳动听的歌曲,在教学过程中能激发学生的学习兴趣,活跃课堂气氛,使学生在学习过程中爱上生物化学;在生物化学歌曲的创作过程中,能促进学生的思考创新,内化重点难点,使深奥的问题形象化;在学习过程中用歌声展现生物化学的魅力,让知识成为有趣的知识,让其成为有趣的学习者。本文介绍了国内生物化学歌曲发展壮大历程,结合具体实例从利用生物化学歌曲引入教学、理解生物化学内容、密切联系生活三方面评论了生物化学歌曲在辅助生物化学教学中的应用,并从歌词的改编、旋律的选择、歌曲的传唱、教学的设计等方面需要注意的问题进行讨论。     

Unifying concepts of biological function from molecules to ecosystems

The concept of function arises at all levels of biological study and is often loosely and variously defined, especially within ecology. This has led to ambiguity, obscuring the common structure that unites levels of biological organisation, from molecules to ecosystems. Here we build on already successful ideas from molecular biology and complexity theory to create a precise definition of biological function which spans levels of biological organisation and can be quantified in the unifying currency of biomass, enabling comparisons of functional effectiveness (irrespective of the specific function) across the field of ecology. We give precise definitions of ecological and ecosystem function that bring clarity and precision to studies of biodiversity– ecosystem function relationships and questions of ecological redundancy. To illustrate the new concepts and their unifying power, we construct a simple community‐level model with nutrient cycling and animal‐plant mutualism, emphasising the importance of its network structure in determining overall functioning. This type of network structure is that of an autocatalytic set of functional relationships, which also appears at biochemical, cellular and organism levels of organisation, creating a nested hierarchy. This enables a common and unifying concept of function to apply from molecular interaction networks up to the global ecosystem.     

Ecological niche differentiation in the Aphelocoma jays: a phylogenetic perspective

The Aphelocoma jays have become an important touchstone in behavioural ecology and biogeography – the corpus of studies of this genus makes it an important point of reference. Aphelocoma evolutionary history, nevertheless, has been the subject of two papers reaching opposite conclusions, even though they were based on the same allozyme data set. Herein, we present a second molecular data set – 500 bases of the ND2 gene – and analyse it cladistically to arrive at a new hypothesis of phylogenetic relationships. Recent hypotheses by other investigators of a hybrid origin of Aphelocoma populations are strongly contradicted. The ecological context within which these evolutionary processes are taking place is characterized using new tools for modelling ecological niches of species along a spectrum from humid tropical to dry temperate habitats. Evolutionary patterns of ecological niches are shown to consist of drastic departures from rate-uniformity and ecological niche conservatism.  © 2003 The Linnean Society of London, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society , 2003, 80 , 369–383.     

景感生态学方法与实践综述

当前生态学研究前沿正在走向城市,更加关注城市中人类福祉的多元化。而我们在工作中也深刻体会到,对于以人为核心的城市复合生态系统,有一些问题用已有学科是难以解决的。在这一情况下,提出了景感生态学这一研究方向。系统阐述了景感生态学的概念与内涵、学科框架、研究框架,从国家重大开发建设中的生态环境保障系统方案和景感生态规划与设计等方面总结了景感生态学的研究进展,并就景感生态学发展方向和重点提出展望。     

Embryonic recapitulation, coenogenesis and heterochrony. An attempt at a comparative analysis of the relationships between embryogenesis and evolution.

The relationships between embryogenesis and the scale of living beings have been the subject of long-dated observations. It is well known that Haeckel, going back and codifying this data, has divided it into two large groups called palingenesis and coenogenesis. He has only mentioned the concept of heterochrony to which we give much more importance nowadays. We will look over these questions and link them up with some aspects of modern genetics.     

Correlation-associated peptide networks of human cerebrospinal fluid

Profiling of peptides and small proteins from either human body fluids or tissues by chromatography and subsequent mass spectrometry reveals several thousand individual peptide signals per sample. Any peptide is an intermediate in the course of biosynthesis, post-translational modification (PTM), proteolytic processing and degradation. Changes in the concentration of one peptide often affects the concentration of the other, hence a challenge consists in the development of suitable tools to turn this large amount of data into biologically relevant information. Comprehensive statistical analysis of the peptide profiling data allows associating peptides, which are closely related in terms of peptide biochemistry. Here, the bioinformatic concept of peptide networks, correlation-associated peptide networks (CANs), is introduced. Peptides with statistical similarity of their concentrations are grouped in form of networks, and these networks are interpreted in terms of peptide biochemistry. The spectrum of functional relationships found in cerebrospinal fluid CAN covers PTM and proteolytic degradation of peptides, clearance processing in the complement cascade, common secretion of peptides by neuroendocrine cells as well as ubiquitin-mediated degradation. Our results indicate that CAN is a powerful bioinformatic tool for the systematic analysis and interpretation of large peptidomics and proteomics data and helps to discover novel bioactive and diagnostic peptides.