While there is a sound understanding of the range of mechanisms by which biochar can contribute to the mitigation of soil N2O emissions, a paucity of information remains on the efficacy and mechanisms associated with biochar-based fertilizer (BF). The present 12-month field trial aimed to: (1) investigate the responses of the seasonal variations in soil N2O emissions and environmental factors, including

Climate change is predicted to increase drought and flooding events in the coming decades, especially in the tropics; we need to understand the short-term responses of plant community and soil microarthropods populations to these extreme events.Yet most of our current knowledge on this comes from manipulative studies in temperate regions. The present study reports the impact of a severe summer drought

Robinia pseudoacacia is a widely planted pioneer tree species in reforestations on barren mountains in northern China. Because of its nitrogen-fixing ability, it can play a positive role in soil and forest restoration. After clear-cutting of planted stands, R. pseudoacacia stands become coppice plantations. The impacts of shifting from seedling to coppice stands on soil bacterial community and soil

Socio-economically, different species of Flemingia are used worldwide for various purposes like food, folk medicine to cure various ailments, as a source of non-timber products (e.g., resin, dye, host for lac insect, toothbrush, etc.). Therefore, species level identification is important even in the absence of reproductive structures as it will help to avoid adulteration. In this context, petiole anatomy

The core area of Central Asia (CA), an arid Westerlies-dominated area, is crucial for analysis of interregional atmospheric circulation interactions along the Eurasian mid-latitude belt. However, it remains unclear how climate and environment in this region evolved during the Quaternary Period. Based on the articles in this special issue, this review recapitulates the spatio-temporal distribution of

Magnetic susceptibility measurements play a key role in Quaternary studies. Magnetic proxies, such as low field and frequency-dependent magnetic susceptibility, are widely applied in the reconstruction of terrestrial paleoclimate, e.g., in the study of loess-paleosol successions. In general, the interpretation of loess magnetic susceptibility signals is based on two commonly accepted models: the pedogenic

During IODP expedition 359 multiple holes recovered Modern to Middle Miocene sediments from the Kardiva Drift which is strongly influenced by monsoonally-driven currents. Two holes continued below the drift into Lower Miocene sediments that were deposited under rather different conditions following Oligocene subsidence of the Maldives Ridge. These sediments are characterised by marked alternation between

Radiodonts are a morphologically and ecologically diverse clade of stem-group euarthropods that occupied numerous ecological niches in early animal ecosystems. Many Cambrian taxa are considered apex predators, primarily due to the possession of raptorial frontal appendage, though sweep and filter-feeding examples were also prevalent. Four major families have been distinguished including Anomalocarididae

In an era of coral reef decline, coral restoration is receiving increasing attention, with many recent developments in culture and transplant techniques. However, how the ecological processes operating on coral reefs influence the success of restoration efforts remains largely unexplored, particularly during the first months after outplanting which are considered crucial for colony survival. Herbivory

Two predator – one prey systems are widespread in nature, and have been important to both ecological theory and practice. A primary question for these systems is whether the two predators produce “emergent effects”: greater or less prey mortality than expected based on the two predators acting alone. We conducted an in-lab experiment on a two predator (the crab Cancer productus and the sea-star Evasterias

While evidence for the role of the microbiome in shaping host stress tolerance is becoming well-established, to what extent this depends on the interaction between the host and its local microbiome is less clear. Therefore, we investigated whether locally adapted gut microbiomes affect host stress tolerance. In the water flea Daphnia magna, we studied if the host performs better when receiving a microbiome

Pathogen species often consist of genetically distinct strains, which can establish mixed infections or coinfections in the host. In coinfections, interactions between pathogen strains can have important consequences for their transmission success. We used the tick-borne bacterium Borrelia afzelii, which is the most common cause of Lyme disease in Europe, as a model multi-strain pathogen to investigate

1. Torpor, or a regulated drop in body temperature and metabolic rate, allows animals to inhabit energetically costly environments, but among torpor‐using species, we have a poor understanding of how plasticity in torpor use relates to the experienced environment.

A prerequisite for effective antipredator responses is the ability of prey to distinguish animals that pose a threat from those that do not. Prey often have efficient learning mechanisms to learn threats but learning to recognize nonpredators may be equally or more important. Moreover, the ability to generalize learned information is of key importance for prey animals. Prey take information they know

1. Biodiversity loss and changes in plant community composition induced by anthropogenic nitrogen (N) deposition exert profound effects on ecosystem functions. However, limited studies have considered the joint effects of plant community composition, plant species richness, plant functional diversity and soil biodiversity on the dynamics of soil autotrophic and heterotrophic respiration under extra

Functional traits can determine pairwise species interactions, such as those between plants and pollinators. However, the effects of biogeography and evolutionary history on trait‐matching and trait‐mediated resource specialization remain poorly understood. We compiled a database of 93 mutualistic hummingbird‐plant networks (including 181 hummingbird and 1,256 plant species), complemented by morphological

Objective To study the association between ambient air pollutant exposure during the follicular phase and in vitro fertilization (IVF) outcomes. Design A single-center retrospective analysis. Setting Henan Province, China. Patients Patients (n = 6659) living in Zhengzhou, Henan Province in central China who underwent their first IVF cycle at the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University between

International commercial trade in wildlife, whether legal or illegal, is one of the greatest threats to multiple species of wildlife today. Opinions on how to address it are deeply divided across the conservation community. Approaches fall into two broad categories: making the trade illegal to protect against any form of commercial trade or allowing some or all of the trade to be legal and seeking

The Danshuei River has a third largest catchment area and third longest in Taiwan. It flows through the capital, Taipei, and more than six million people live within its catchment area. Its estuary is characterized by a highly variable chemical and physical environment that is affected by the interaction of inland freshwater runoff with wastewater, and toward the coast is also influenced by the China

Termites are “social cockroaches” and amongst the most phenotypically plastic insects. The different castes (i.e., two types of reproductives, workers, and soldiers) within termite societies are all encoded by a single genome and present the result of differential postembryonic development. Besides the default progressive development into winged sexuals of solitary hemimetabolous insects, termites

Disturbances fundamentally alter ecosystem functions, yet predicting their impacts remains a key scientific challenge. While the study of disturbances is ubiquitous across many ecological disciplines, there is no agreed-upon, cross-disciplinary foundation for discussing or quantifying the complexity of disturbances, and no consistent terminology or methodologies exist. This inconsistency presents an

The ability to predict changes in the abundances of the species in ecological communities is essential for sustainable management, biodiversity conservation, and community restoration. We propose a framework to predict such changes. We test our method, which uses the linear Lotka-Volterra equations (LLVE) as well as other empirical predictors (linear least squares regression, quadratic extrapolation

The objectives of this study were (i) to evaluate the quality of the Ouro River, a tropical Brazilian river, assessing the concentration of the metals in surface waters, sediments, and benthic macroinvertebrates; (ii) to investigate the possible sources of pollution in Ouro River basin through field research and spatial analysis (G.I.S.); (iii) to evaluate the possible occurrence of metals bioaccumulation

This study leveraged the Japanese medaka fish embryo model for the assessment of effects of select contaminants on early development in fish. Fish embryos were exposed to various pharmaceutical contaminants including synthetic hormones and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and their effects on development were observed. Initial screening determined that swim bladder inflation failure was the most

In response to accidental oil spills at sea, chemical oil dispersants are utilized to limit negative impacts on nearby littoral zones. However, current evidence suggests that such dispersants may be toxic to aquatic organisms. Blue mussels (Mytilus edulis) and giant scallops (Placopecten magellanicus) were exposed to different environmentally relevant concentrations of oil dispersant and their behavioural

The consequences of global change cannot be estimated without long-term monitoring programmes. The Kola Meridian transect, along 33°30’E, in the Barents Sea is the longest term monitoring area in the Arctic. Regular (usually annual) hydrobiological benthic surveys along that transect have been performed since 1899. Materials stored in museum collections remain the main source of the faunistic information

Maladaptive habitat selection, where animals select habitat with reduced fitness potential or avoid otherwise suitable habitat, exacerbates the threat of population decline for species vulnerable from habitat loss and fragmentation. The greater sage‐grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) is a species of conservation concern for which research has identified scenarios where populations may be under the

Increasing rates of short‐interval disturbances have the potential to rapidly transform ecosystems via shifts in post‐disturbance regeneration. While research has explored compound events in multiple biomes, we know little regarding how local site conditions interact with short‐interval disturbances to influence post‐disturbance regeneration. Furthermore, questions remain regarding the consequences

Land degradation is a leading cause of biodiversity loss, and understanding its consequences on freshwater ecosystems remains a priority for improving the effectiveness of restoration practices and ecosystem assessments. Freshwater monitoring programs use macroinvertebrates to assess the biotic effects of degradation and management actions, often using the ratio of observed to expected taxa at a site—O/E—for

Video data are widely collected in ecological studies, but manual annotation is a challenging and time‐consuming task, and has become a bottleneck for scientific research. Classification models based on convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have proved successful in annotating images, but few applications have extended these to video classification. We demonstrate an approach that combines a standard

Monitoring local occupancy and the regional distribution of wild mammals is essential to guide species management and set conservation priorities. However, variables such as weather, substrate hardness, or habitat characteristics may indirectly affect the performance of the methods employed for monitoring mammal occurrence. Little information exists about the influence of spatio‐temporal factors on

The spatial scale at which demographic performance (e.g., net reproductive output) varies can profoundly influence landscape‐level population growth and persistence, and many demographically pertinent processes such as species interactions and resource acquisition vary at fine scales. We compared the magnitude of demographic variation associated with fine‐scale heterogeneity (<10 m), with variation

Although different fisheries can be tightly linked to each other by human and ecosystem processes, they are often managed independently. Synchronous fluctuations among fish populations or fishery catches can destabilize ecosystems and economies, respectively, but the degree of synchrony around the world remains unclear. We analyzed 1092 marine fisheries catch time‐series over 60 years to test for the

Land protection efforts represent large societal investments and are critical to biodiversity conservation. Land protection involves a complex mosaic of areas managed by multiple organizations, using a variety of mechanisms to achieve different levels of protection. We develop an approach to synthesize, describe, and map this land protection diversity over large spatial scales. We use cluster analysis

Tracking phenological change in a regionally explicit context is a key to understanding ecosystem status and change. The current study investigated long‐term trends of satellite‐observed land surface phenology (LSP) in the 17 National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) domains across the conterminous United States (CONUS). Characterization of LSP trends was based on a high temporal resolution (3‐day)

Large‐diameter hail is unusual in the lowland tropics, consequently, its impact on water flux responses of trees and lianas due to foliage loss is unknown. In December, 2012, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (21o55'N) in southern Yunnan, China, experienced the most severe hailstorm in approximately 30 years, with hailstones of 8–17 mm diameter falling for 10–30 minutes. We assessed the effect

Although overexploitation threatens some high-profile medicinal animals, little is known about global patterns in the use of—and threats to—medicinal animals. We examined data from the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List and a literature survey to identify a diverse catalog of medicinal animals (n = 1660). Most known species (~77%) are chordates in terrestrial habitats (~72%)

Lignite burning is still the main source of energy in many countries, generating huge amounts of alkaline residues deposited in dumping sites, which affects the surrounding environment. There are only a few publications dealing with the effects on pH changes of surface horizons, but there are no reports on the impact on other soil properties. The aim of this paper was to characterize the changes occurring

About 12 months into the COVID-19 pandemic, its immediate and lasting impacts on the climate system and fossil fuel economy are now better understood. These insights will be fundamental to the global recovery — and ideally the green transitions that accompany it — but the implementation will be hard-won.

Energy systems scenarios project a wide range of uncertainty in solar photovoltaic capacity, often thought to stem from techno-economic assumptions. Now research shows that the underlying sources of this uncertainty might be different than expected.

Five years after the adoption of the Paris Climate Agreement, growth in global CO2 emissions has begun to falter. The pervasive disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic have radically altered the trajectory of global CO2 emissions. Contradictory effects of the post-COVID-19 investments in fossil fuel-based infrastructure and the recent strengthening of climate targets must be addressed with new policy

The deployment of solar photovoltaic (PV) technology has consistently outpaced expectations over the past decade. However, long-term prospects for PV remain deeply uncertain, as recent global scenarios span two orders of magnitude in installed PV capacity by 2050. Here we systematically compile an ensemble of 1,550 scenarios from peer-reviewed and influential grey literature, including IPCC and non-IPCC

Gender has a powerful influence on people’s experience of, and resilience to, climate change. Global climate change policy is committed to tackling gender inequalities in mitigation and adaptation. However, progress is hindered by numerous challenges, including an enduring set of gender assumptions: women are caring and connected to the environment, women are a homogenous and vulnerable group, gender

Communities at any trophic level along the food chain are determined by simultaneous top-down (predators) and bottom-up (nutrients) effects; however, we still lack an understanding of this concept in the soil ecosystem. Here, we aimed to reveal the contributions of the top-down and bottom-up factors on the formation of paddy field bacterial communities. The position of an indigenous bacterial community