A multivariate approach to the selection of biological reserves

Multivariate analysis provides an effective context for the examination of some significant aspects of biodiversity and conservation. The framework is a multidimensional space that integrates sample sites, taxa and environments. This approach enables terms such as representativeness, complementarity and irreplaceability to be integrated within an intuitive and practical framework for reserve design. Cluster analysis is proposed to determine what is there by defining a set of complementary clusters. These clusters are sampled in a representative manner; from the core outward. The degree of irreplaceability of a site is defined as the multivariate distance of each potential reserve site to its nearest neighbour.     

自然保护地生物多样性保护研究进展

建立自然保护地是保护生物多样性最为重要的措施之一。总体来看, 自然保护地生物多样性保护研究主要围绕关键生态系统以及珍稀濒危物种等保护对象的状态以及变化两个层面进行, 并重点关注自然保护地数量与面积、保护了多少重要生态系统和物种、能否有效保护生物多样性等一系列科学问题。然而, 在自然保护地生物多样性保护研究方面, 还缺少针对上述研究领域的系统性综述。为此, 本文系统梳理了自然保护地空间布局及其与生物多样性分布的关系、自然保护地生物多样性变化及其保护成效等近20年来相关领域的研究进展。自然保护地的空间布局以及与生物多样性分布的关系主要围绕自然保护地与生物多样性在某一阶段的状态开展研究, 致力于探究自然保护地“保护多少” “代表性如何” “在哪儿保护”等一系列关键科学问题。同时, 自然保护地内的生物多样性会随着气候变化、人类活动以及自身演替等发生时空动态变化, 基于自然保护地生物多样性变化分析, 各国学者在全球尺度、国家尺度和单个自然保护地进行了大量的保护成效评估研究, 并逐渐发展出了自然保护地内外配对分析方法以提升保护成效评估的精度, 进而识别出不同自然保护地的主要影响因素。在此基础上, 本文进一步对自然保护地生物多样性保护研究提出了展望, 主要包括: (1)综合考虑自然保护地生物多样性状态和变化; (2)开展多目标协同的自然保护地空间优化布局; (3)强化自然保护地主要保护对象的识别、调查与监测; (4)提升自然保护地的质量和连通性; (5)探究自然保护地管理措施与保护成效的关联机制。本文可为“2020年后全球生物多样性框架”的制定与实施特别是在自然保护地体系建设与优化方面提供参考与借鉴。     

A comparative measure of biodiversity based on species composition

In conservation planning, species richness and species endemism are the most often used metrics for describing the biodiversity importance of areas. However, when it comes to prioritizing regions for conservation actions these measures alone are insufficient because they do not reveal how similar or different the actual composition of species may be from one area to another. For comparative analysis an additional useful metric would be one that indicates the degree to which the species assemblage in one area is also represented in—or is distinct from—species assemblages of other areas. Here we describe a method for quantifying the compositional representativeness of species assemblages among geographic regions. The method generates asymmetric pairwise similarity coefficients that are then used to calculate separate measures for the representativeness and the distinctiveness of species assemblages in the regions being compared. We demonstrate the method by comparing fish communities among freshwater ecoregions of the Mississippi Basin, and then among smaller hydrological units within two individual freshwater ecoregions. At both scales of analysis, our measures of representativeness and distinctiveness reveal patterns of fish species composition that differ from patterns of species richness. This information can enhance conservation planning processes by ensuring that priority-setting explicitly consider the most representative and distinctive species assemblages.     

Linking Data Choices and Context Specificity in Life Cycle Assessment of Waste Treatment Technologies: A Landfill Case Study

To generate meaningful results, life cycle assessments (LCAs) require accurate technology data that are consistent with the goal and scope of the analysis. While literature data are available for many products and processes, finding representative data for highly site‐specific technologies, such as waste treatment processes, remains a challenge. This study investigated representative life cycle inventory (LCI) modeling of waste treatment technologies in consideration of variations in technological level and climate. The objectives were to demonstrate the importance of representative LCI modeling as a function of the specificity of the study, and to illustrate the necessity of iteratively refining the goal and scope of the study as data are developed. A landfill case study was performed where 52 discrete landfill data sets were built and grouped to represent different technology options and geographical sites, potential impacts were calculated, and minimum/maximum (min‐max) intervals were generated for each group. The results showed decreasing min‐max intervals with increasing specificity of the scope of study, which indicates that compatibility between the scope of study and LCI model is critical. Hereby, this study quantitatively demonstrates the influence of representative modeling on LCA results. The results indicate that technology variations and site‐specific conditions (e.g., the influence of precipitation and cover permeability on landfill gas generation and collection) should be carefully addressed by a systematic analysis of the key process parameters. Therefore, a thorough understanding of the targeted waste treatment technologies is necessary to ensure that appropriate data choices are made within the boundaries of the defined scope of the study.     

陆地生态系统碳水通量贡献区评价综述

综述了通量贡献区研究的基本理论、最新进展、研究热点与难点,旨在促进中国区域碳水通量数据空间代表性的定量评价.通量贡献区是通量观测点上风向的空间代表区域,能够反映代表区域对应下垫面的源区内每一点对观测点的通量贡献权重影响,主要受观测高度、空气动力学粗糙度和大气稳定度等因素的影响.通量贡献区通常随着观测高度的增加、空气动力学粗糙度的降低和大气稳定度的增加而变大,反之则变小.通量贡献区的评价模型包括解析模型、拉格朗日随机模型、大涡模拟和闭合模型四类.通量贡献区的评价结果可以广泛应用于通量数据质量评价、实验设计的指导、与遥感技术结合的区域尺度的总初级生产力的估算、城市CO2通量变化的评估以及能量闭合的评价等研究.最新研究表明,对流边界层的通量贡献区存在负的通量贡献区域;有裸地存在的情况下解析模型通常会低估裸地对观测通量的贡献;与水平地面处的通量贡献区相比,山谷处通量贡献区变小而山脊处的通量贡献区变大.通量贡献区模型研究应进一步考虑大气中的平流效应、湍流的非高斯扩散以及建立冠层内部的通量贡献区模型.解决森林冠层内流场的不均匀性、冠层重叠问题、冠层湍流的不稳定性是建立适合冠层内部通量贡献区模型的前提条件.在理想条件的气体释放验证试验的基础上,需要开展复杂条件下的相关试验.     

Biodiversity surrogate groups and conservation priority areas: birds of the Brazilian Cerrado

The choice of surrogates of biodiversity is an important aspect in conservation biology. The quantification of the coincidence in the spatial patterns of species richness and rarity between different groups and the vulnerability of groups are different approaches frequently considered to accomplish this task. However, a more appropriate approach is to verify the efficiency of priority networks selected using information from one group of organisms to capture the biodiversity of other groups. Using a deconstructive approach, the main purposes of this study were to evaluate the performance of some orders and families of birds in the Cerrado biome (a savanna-like biome) as surrogates of other bird groups, in a pairwise analysis, and to investigate the characteristics of these groups that predict the efficiency in representation of other groups. We used biogeographical data on bird orders or families with more than 10 species that occur in the Brazilian Cerrado. The best surrogate group was the Thamnophilidae. Moreover, this group is not the most specious, favouring further survey efforts that are necessary to verify the conservation value of areas at suitable scales. The majority of the species from this family are dependent on forest habitats, one of the characteristics that most influenced representativeness level, probably due to the spatial distribution of these habitats throughout the Brazilian Cerrado. Beta diversity patterns of the different groups also affected representativeness, and our analyses showed that the networks selected by a surrogate group will be more effective in the representation of other groups of species if their patterns of beta diversity (not richness) are correlated.     

我国旱地小麦区域试验精确度及其环境综合评价

选用2003-2009年我国4个麦区、233个品种(系)、82个试点组成的全国旱地冬春小麦区域试验产量资料,研究了我国旱地小麦国家区域试验点的精确度、环境鉴别力和代表性,并对试验环境进行综合评价．结果表明：一年一点试验平均试验误差变异系数(CV)为6.1%,平均相对最小显著差数(RLSD)为10.5%,一年多点试验的CV值均在8.2%以内,大多数试点的CV和RLSD控制得较好,试验精确度和品种比较精确度均较高．试点分辨力以西北春小麦组最强,其他3个产区差别不大．试点代表性以东北春小麦组最好、西北春小麦组最差．在综合考虑试点分辨力和代表性基础上,借助GGE模型构建环境综合评价参数（r_g-h）,结果显示,我国旱地小麦理想试点比例只有32.4%,产区间比较,理想试点的比例依次为：西北春小麦旱地组（40.9%）＞东北春小麦旱地组（33.3%）＞黄淮冬小麦旱地组（30.4%）＞北部冬小麦旱地组（21.4%）.     

Representing biodiversity: Data and procedures for identifying priority areas for conservation

Biodiversity priority areas together should represent the biodiversity of the region they are situated in. To achieve this, biodiversity has to be measured, biodiversity goals have to be set and methods for implementing those goals have to be applied. Each of these steps is discussed. Because it is impossible to measure all of biodiversity, biodiversity surrogates have to be used. Examples are taxa sub-sets, species assemblages and environmental domains. Each of these has different strengths and weaknesses, which are described and evaluated. In real-world priority setting, some combination of these is usually employed. While a desirable goal might be to sample all of biodiversity from genotypes to ecosystems, an achievable goal is to represent, at some agreed level, each of the biodiversity features chosen as surrogates. Explicit systematic procedures for implementing such a goal are described. These procedures use complementarity, a measure of the contribution each area in a region makes to the conservation goal, to estimate irreplaceability and flexibility, measures of the extent to which areas can be substituted for one another in order to take competing land uses into account. Persistence and vulnerability, which also play an important role in the priority setting process, are discussed briefly.     

Capture probability of fishes in Central European (Hungary) wadeable lowland streams

Neglect of imperfect capture efficiency leads to biased inferences on population abundance, and correspondingly, seriously affects ecological research, bioassessment, conservation, and fisheries management. To date, many research studies have studied capture efficiency of salmonid fishes, but the catchability of fishes living in non-salmonid streams has received much less attention. This paper estimates capture probability for seven fish species in densely vegetated lowland streams by using double-pass electrofishing data and an N-mixture removal model. Results show that capture probability can vary among species, and between-stream differences have a stronger influence on the abundance and the catchability than within-stream variability. Estimation uncertainty decreases with observed abundance, and the mean catchability tends to be the highest for the medium abundant species. These findings suggest that relative abundances from single-pass data are biased to a species- and habitat-specific degree. Therefore, plausible estimation of capture probability from double-pass electrofishing requires data collected from numerous sites that cover a wide range of the environmental gradient in lowland streams.