Our February issue is now online! Our second issue of the year contains 22 high-quality articles about the latest methods in ecology and evolution. This month we have methods for visualising the tree of life, estimating arthropod abundance and diversity, disentangling effects of climate and land use on biodiversity and much more! This issue also contains four Applications and two Practical Tools articles that are free to … Continue reading February Issue Out Now
To celebrate our 10th Anniversary, we are highlighting a key article from each of our volumes. For Volume 7 we selected ‘The ecologist’s field guide to sequence‐based identification of biodiversity’ by Creer et al. (2016).
In this post, two of our Associate Editors with expertise in eDNA, Lynsey Harper and Chloe Robinson, select their favourite MEE papers in this field.
Continue reading “10th Anniversary Volume 7: eDNA Editor’s Choice”
To celebrate the 10th Anniversary of the launch of Methods in Ecology and Evolution, we are highlighting an article from each volume to feature in the Methods.blog. For Volume 7, we have selected ‘The ecologist’s field guide to sequence‐based identification of biodiversity’ by Creer et al. (2016).
In this post, the authors share their motivation behind the paper and discuss advances in sequence‐based identification of biodiversity.
Continue reading “10th Anniversary Volume 7: The ecologist’s field guide to sequence‐based identification of biodiversity”
To celebrate the 10th Anniversary of the launch of Methods in Ecology and Evolution, we are highlighting an article from each volume to feature in the Methods.blog. For Volume 2, we have selected ‘Methods for Collaboratively Identifying Research Priorities and Emerging Issues in Science and Policy’ by Sutherland et al. (2011). In this post, the authors discuss the background and key concepts of the article, and changes in the relation between science and policy since the paper was published.
Between the late 1990s and early 2000s, recognition of the value of scientific evidence to government decision-making grew. As interest in projecting future issues to inform policy decisions increased, we recognised that ecologists did not have the methods to conduct this type of work effectively. In the United Kingdom, the Government Office for Science established the Foresight programme to support policy making; scientific advisory committees became common, and every Ministry appointed a Chief Scientist. Given this context, we explored the use of horizon scans to assess the future and better understand uncertainties.
Imagine that you want to catalogue all of the biodiversity (all of the living organisms) from a particular location; how many trained experts would that require? How many person hours would it take to collect and identify all of the rare, well-disguised, and microscopic organisms? How many of these organisms would have to be removed from the environment and taken back to a lab for taxonomic analysis.
Although there is no substitute for human expertise, we have begun using the traces of DNA that organisms leave behind (e.g. excretions, skin and hair cells) in the environment to catalogue biodiversity. These traces of DNA, referred to as environmental DNA, can persist in the environment for minutes or can persist for centuries depending on where they end up. This field of environmental DNA (eDNA) is rapidly becoming an effective tool to complement surveys of biodiversity, both past and present.
Continue reading “Anacapa Toolkit: Automating the Cataloguing of Biodiversity”The January issue of Methods is now online!
It’s a new year and the new issue of Methods in Ecology and Evolution is now online!
We’re starting 2020 with a great issue – and ALL of the articles are completely free. And they’ll remain free for the whole year. No subscription required.
You can find out more about our Featured Articles (selected by the Senior Editor) below. We also discuss this month’s Open Access, Practical Tools and Applications articles. There are also articles on species distributions, biotic interactions, taxonomic units and much more.
Continue reading “Issue 11.1: Climate Change, Genomic Divergence, Bayesian Modelling and More”
Hello! This is my first post as Blog Editor for Methods in Ecology and Evolution and I’m thrilled to be starting with an exciting, thought-provoking topic in the wake of Halloween. But first, let me introduce myself. I currently work as a Postdoctoral Fellow and Project Manager in the Hajibabaei Lab at the Centre for Biodiversity Genomics (University of Guelph, ON, Canada) and my undergraduate and postgraduate degrees are both from Swansea University (UK). My research background is largely focused around the application of environmental DNA (i.e. free DNA found in natural environments) to detect and monitor aquatic species and answer ecological questions through both single-species detection and DNA metabarcoding.
At the moment, I’m working on the STREAM project, which combines community-based monitoring with DNA metabarcoding to gain a better understanding of freshwater health across Canada. One of my favourite parts about being in this position is the opportunity to get involved with other research being conducted in the Hajibabaei Lab. This is how I branched out into the wonderful world of bat ecology. Continue reading “Bats aren’t just for Halloween: Insectivorous Bats in North America”
The September issue of Methods is now online!
We’ve got another brilliant issue of Methods in Ecology and Evolution out today. In another bumper 250 page offering, you’ll find articles on identifying waterbird hotspots, identity metrics, capture-recapture methods (and the alternative close-kin mark-recpature) and way more.
Don’t have a subscription to the journal? No need to worry – this month’s issue has TEN articles that are free to access for absolutely anyone. You can find out about all 10 below.
Keep reading for a little more information on the September issue of Methods in Ecology and Evolution. Continue reading “Issue 10.9: Phenotypes, Species Interactions, Biodiversity and More”
An adult sleepy lizard with a GPS tracker and body temperature logger strapped to her tail. ©Mike Bull.
Changes in temperature and available food determine where and when animals move, reproduce, and survive. Our understanding of how environmental change impacts biodiversity and species survival is well-established at the landscape, country and global scales. But, we know less about what could happen at finer space and time scales, such as within habitats, where behavioural responses by animals are crucial for daily survival.
Key questions at these scales are how the states of individuals (things like body temperature and nutritional condition) influence movement decisions in response to habitat change, and how these decisions relate to patchiness in microclimates and food. So we need tools to make reliable forecasts of how fine-scale habitat use will change under future environments. Individual-based movement simulation models are powerful tools for these kinds of studies. They let you construct habitats that vary in temperature and food conditions in both space and time and ask ‘what if’ questions. By populating these models with activity, behaviour, and movement data of animals, we can simulate different habitat conditions and predict how animals will respond to future change. Continue reading “Where do Animals Spend Their Time and Energy? Theory, Simulations and GPS Trackers Can Help Us Find Out”
To find out about changes in ancient ecosystems we need to analyse fossil databases that register the taxonomy and stratigraphic (temporal) positions of fossils. These data can be used to detect changes of taxonomic diversity and to draft time series of originations and extinctions.
The story would be so simple if it wasn’t the effects of heterogeneous and incomplete sampling: the white spots in our understanding of where and when species lived exactly. This phenomenon decreases the fidelity of face-value patterns extracted from the fossil record, making them less reliable. It must be considered if we want to get a glimpse into the biology or the distribution of life in space and time. Naturally, several metrics have been proposed to overcome this problem, each claiming to accurately depict the patterns of ancient life. Continue reading “Revisiting Past Biodiversity with the divDyn R Package”
Methods Blog 