植被变化对气候的反馈机制及调节效应

植被通过光合作用固定大气中的CO₂来减缓温室效应，同时植被也通过改变地表能量收支影响温室效应。在过去的气候-植被研究中，大多关注气候变化对植被的影响，而植被对气候反馈的研究相对较少。植被通过调节地表能量收支、水通量等重要地气过程影响局地、区域乃至全球气候，在气候变化中的作用十分重要。因此，需要厘清植被对气候的反馈效应机制及其结果，并识别其地域差异。从生物地球物理和生物地球化学过程两方面分析植被与气候之间的作用机制，对全球及关键区域内植被变化对局地、区域乃至全球的气候反馈效应进行了系统总结：（1）生物地球物理反馈的区域特征明显，生物地球化学反馈则表现在全球尺度上，二者相互作用但难以统一；（2）植被破坏带来的气候影响在气温效应方面与生态系统的类型及地理分布相关：热带森林破坏带来增温效应，北方森林破坏带来降温效应，温带森林破坏则会通过增加森林反照率抵消丢失的固碳降温效应，气温效应表现不明显；（3）当前研究对关键过程机制考虑不够完善，不同研究方法的结果差异较大，且缺乏高质量观测数据的验证；同时考虑生物地球物理和生物地球化学的净气候反馈研究尚无法支撑植树造林对气候变化单一减缓作用的常规理解。本文可为科学评估植树造林对气候变化作用的方向与强度提供理论依据。     

Social structure of primate interaction networks facilitates the emergence of cooperation

Animal cooperation has puzzled biologists for a long time as its existence seems to contravene the basic notion of evolutionary biology that natural selection favours ‘selfish’ genes that promote only their own well-being. Evolutionary game theory has shown that cooperators can prosper in populations of selfish individuals if they occur in clusters, interacting more frequently with each other than with the selfish. Here we show that social networks of primates possess the necessary social structure to promote the emergence of cooperation. By simulating evolutionary dynamics of cooperative behaviour on interaction networks of 70 primate groups, we found that for most groups network reciprocity augmented the fixation probability for cooperation. The variation in the strength of this effect can be partly explained by the groups’ community modularity—a network measure for the groups’ heterogeneity. Thus, given selective update and partner choice mechanisms, network reciprocity has the potential to explain socially learned forms of cooperation in primate societies.     

Harvest of red-legged partridge in central Spain

A basic rule to attain sustainable use of harvested resources is to adjust take to availability. Populations of red-legged partridges in Spain have decreased in recent decades, and releases of farm-bred partridges to improve short-term availability are increasingly common. We used questionnaires and bird surveys to assess whether harvest was related to availability of wild partridges or intensity of farm-bred partridge releases. We studied 50 hunting estates, including 6 administratively labeled as intensive (with few numerical and temporal restrictions to releases). In addition, we considered hunting pressure (number of hunters × hunting days/km²) and habitat as explanatory variables in the analyses. In intensive estates, annual harvest was exclusively related to release intensity, indicating that in these estates hunting is detached from natural resources and approaches an industrial activity based on external inputs. In non-intensive estates, harvest was affected by wild stock availability, walked-up shooting pressure, and habitat (greater harvest in estates with more Mediterranean shrubland). In these estates, releases did not increase annual harvest, and can be considered an inefficient practice. Additionally, the relationship between abundance estimates and harvest disappeared in estates with low partridge abundance estimates, suggesting possibilities for overharvesting in a large proportion of estates. Increasing the abundance of wild red-legged partridge through techniques like habitat management, and improving the adjustment of harvest to availability, may be a good strategy to increase long-term harvest in non-intensive estates. Additionally, Government and managers must create ways to segregate and label the estates where only wild red-legged partridges are managed from those where releases are used, to reduce ecological costs of management decisions. © 2012 The Wildlife Society.     

The cost of polygyny and the evolution of female care in poison frogs

Previous research on a variety of organisms indicates that polygyny can impose a cost on the reproductive success of females. Some authors have hypothesized that this cost may have caused the evolution of female parental care from paternal or biparental care in some lineages, particularly in poison frogs of the genus Dendrobates. In this paper, we evaluate the assumptions and theoretical implications of this hypothesis and present several game-theoretic models that clarify some of the issues. We conclude that a cost of polygyny is unlikely to drive a female care strategy to fixation on its own; however, if caring males suffer a cost of lost mating opportunities then a cost of polygyny may destabilize male care and result in the evolution of uniparental female care. A cost of polygyny on its own may be able to drive a transition from male care to biparental care. We also discuss other factors that may have influenced the evolution of parental care in the poison frogs, including results from recent field and laboratory research, and we evaluate the possibility that female care evolved from biparental, as opposed to male care.