Editorial Material
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Andrew P. Hendry
Summary: Ecological change and evolution have a feedback mechanism where ecological change influences evolution, and in turn, evolution affects ecological change. A study using Timema stick insects demonstrates the existence of such feedbacks in nature, showing that they can occur rapidly, have a strong impact, and contribute to stability.
Review
Ecology
Isabel M. Smallegange
Summary: There is a growing need to incorporate developmental plasticity into the framework of eco-evolutionary dynamics. The traditional genotype-specified reaction norms focus on genetic inheritance and gene-based phenotype expression, while the proposed developmental system perspective emphasizes the formation of phenotypes during individual development, involving complex interactions among genes, biochemistry, somatic state, and the (a)biotic environment.
TRENDS IN ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
(2022)
Article
Ecology
Masato Yamamichi, Theo Gibbs, Jonathan M. Levine
Summary: This study suggests that rapid evolution occurring concurrently with competition may enable species coexistence. The authors extend the interpretation of modern coexistence theory metrics to systems where competitors evolve, defining eco-evolutionary versions of these metrics. They find that the eco-evolutionary niche and competitive ability differences are a combination of ecological and evolutionary processes, accurately predicting the potential for stable coexistence in eco-evolutionary dynamics.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Laura S. Zamorano, Zachariah Gompert, Emanuel A. Fronhofer, Jeffrey L. Feder, Patrik Nosil
Summary: There is increasing evidence that evolution and ecology can operate on the same time-scale, with evolution influencing ecological processes and vice versa. However, direct empirical evidence for eco-evolutionary feedback is rare. This study shows in the wild that a plant-feeding arthropod community exhibits a negative feedback loop between adaptation in cryptic coloration, bird predation, and arthropod abundance, suggesting that eco-evolutionary feedbacks can stabilize complex systems.
Article
Ecology
Sebastien Lion, Akira Sasaki, Mike Boots
Summary: Understanding the interaction between ecological processes and evolutionary dynamics of quantitative traits in natural systems is a challenge. Two main theoretical frameworks, adaptive dynamics and quantitative genetics, have strengths and limitations and are used by different research communities. To make progress, a novel theoretical framework called 'oligomorphic dynamics' is proposed to bridge the gap between these approaches and strengthen the link to empirical data. Oligomorphic dynamics considers environmental feedback and can analyze eco-evolutionary dynamics, including multimodal trait distributions and non-normal or skewed distributions encountered in nature, facilitating a tighter integration between theory and data.
Article
Ecology
Edeline Eric, Loeuille Nicolas
Summary: Harvesting can lead to body downsizing and population declines, which are not only direct consequences of harvest selection but also result from changes in ecological features, indirectly reshaping natural selection through eco-evolutionary feedback loops.
Review
Environmental Sciences
Joost Samir Mansour, Konstantinos Anestis
Summary: Mixotrophy, characterized by the combination of phototrophy and phagotrophy within a single organism, is a significant trophic mode in aquatic ecosystems. The establishment of permanent plastids in mixoplankton is largely due to gene transfer from prey and/or endosymbionts, with active transcription of plastid-related genes helping to maintain and extend retention of kleptoplasts. Response of mixoplankton to environmental changes like temperature, nutrient availability, and prey abundance is variable and species-specific.
FRONTIERS IN MARINE SCIENCE
(2021)
Review
Ecology
Masato Yamamichi, Andrew D. Letten, Sebastian J. Schreiber
Summary: Growing evidence suggests that temporally fluctuating environments play a crucial role in maintaining variation within and between species. However, studies of genetic variation within populations have been primarily conducted by evolutionary biologists, while population and community ecologists have focused more on species diversity. This article reviews theoretical and empirical studies in population genetics and community ecology, exploring the connection between the "temporal storage effect" and diversity maintenance. By comparing and synthesizing ecological and evolutionary approaches, the authors aim to enhance our understanding of diversity maintenance in nature.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Akihiko Mougi
Summary: Microbes interact with their environment by modifying it and reacting to these modifications, and recent research has shown that the ecological consequences of these interactions can be predicted from their effects on pH. Adaptation of pH niche can affect microbial coexistence, but the mechanisms underlying this effect are not yet understood. This study demonstrates that ecological theory may have difficulty in accurately predicting ecological consequences when there are adaptive changes in pH niche.
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
(2023)
Review
Microbiology
Bryden Fields, Ville-Petri Friman
Summary: Microbial communities play a crucial role in plant health and productivity, and the rapid evolution of microbes in the rhizosphere has significant impacts on the ecological dynamics within and between plant generations. Understanding how evolution shapes the plant-microbe ecosystem functioning and recognizing the importance of intraspecies diversity are essential in harnessing the benefits of soil microbes for sustainable agriculture.
CURRENT OPINION IN MICROBIOLOGY
(2022)
Review
Ecology
Isabel Blasco-Costa, Alexander Hayward, Robert Poulin, Juan A. Balbuena
Summary: It is crucial to integrate advances from ecology and evolutionary biology into cophylogeny for deeper mechanistic insights and to turn cophylogeny into a platform for understanding interspecific interactions and diversification. Key directions include trait reconstruction integration and consideration of multiple scales of network organization, with recent developments providing opportunities for implementation. A new quantitative framework is proposed to allow the integration of relevant information and assessment of individual mechanisms' contributions to cophylogenetic patterns.
TRENDS IN ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
(2021)
Review
Ecology
Jelena H. Pantel, Lutz Becks
Summary: While the reciprocal effects of ecological and evolutionary dynamics on biodiversity are recognized as important, detecting and understanding these feedbacks remains challenging due to their occurrence at different scales and levels of organization. Recent advances in statistical methods and hypothesis testing provide a promising approach to identifying eco-evolutionary drivers even in non-model systems. This literature review discusses these advances and the challenges of fitting mechanistic models to eco-evolutionary data.
TRENDS IN ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
(2023)
Article
Mathematics, Interdisciplinary Applications
Lixuan Cao, Bin Wu
Summary: This work focuses on a dynamic strategy updating model with payoff-dependent environmental feedback, identifying conditions for stable internal equilibria. Results indicate that sensitivity of environmental degradation rates to defector's payoffs promotes cooperation, while sensitivity of enhancement rates to cooperator's payoffs inhibits cooperation. The relative speed of environmental and strategy dynamics has a qualitative influence on the overall system dynamics.
CHAOS SOLITONS & FRACTALS
(2021)
Article
Ecology
Kelsey Lyberger, Thomas W. Schoener, Sebastian J. Schreiber
Summary: The study demonstrates that size-based harvesting not only selects for larger individuals but also decreases population density, significantly impacting the life-history evolution of organisms. The results show that both size selection and density-dependent selection are important drivers of life-history evolution.
Article
Biology
Alexander Lalejini, Emily Dolson, Anya E. Vostinar, Luis Zaman
Summary: Directed microbial evolution utilizes evolutionary processes in the laboratory to create microorganisms with enhanced or novel functional traits. This study investigates the effectiveness of multiobjective selection algorithms from evolutionary computing in directing the evolution of microbial populations. The findings suggest that these algorithms outperform commonly used methods in laboratory settings, highlighting the potential for their application in directed evolution.
Article
Marine & Freshwater Biology
Rebecca Oester, Paula C. dos Reis Oliveira, Marcelo S. Moretti, Florian Altermatt, Andreas Bruder
Summary: Headwater streams are important habitats for diverse macroinvertebrate communities and leaf litter breakdown. This study investigates the influence of riparian vegetation type on leaf-associated macroinvertebrate communities and leaf litter breakdown rates in headwater streams of Switzerland. The results show that forested sites have higher abundance, diversity, and biomass of sensitive taxa and shredders compared to non-forested sites. Additionally, fragmentation rates, primarily caused by macroinvertebrate shredding, are three times higher in forested sites. These findings highlight the importance of riparian vegetation in shaping both the composition and functioning of aquatic ecosystems.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Francois Keck, Florian Altermatt
Summary: DNA barcoding and metabarcoding have revolutionized the study and survey of biodiversity. A comprehensive and accurate reference database is crucial for assigning taxonomic labels to the retrieved DNA sequence data. However, traditional tools like spreadsheets become insufficient when dealing with large amounts of data and complex validation operations. The R package refdb provides scientists with a user-friendly and powerful tool to manipulate and manage DNA reference databases, contributing to standardization and repeatability in barcoding and metabarcoding studies.
MOLECULAR ECOLOGY RESOURCES
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Tianna Peller, Frederic Guichard, Florian Altermatt
Summary: Partial migration has different impacts on individuals' spatiotemporal distribution, food web, and ecosystem-level processes compared to full migration. Whether an individual migrates or not is correlated with its morphological, physiological, and behavioral traits that shape its impact on the food web and ecosystem. Food web and ecosystem dynamics can drive the proportion of population migration.
Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Jan Martini, Franziska Walther, Tamara Schenekar, Emil Birnstiel, Remo Wuthrich, Rebecca Oester, Bernadette Schindelegger, Thea Schwingshackl, Olivia Wilfling, Florian Altermatt, Matthew Talluto, Gabriel Singer, Simon Vitecek
Summary: The mayfly Prosopistoma pennigerum was once widespread in European river networks, but due to river alterations, it is now largely extinct in Europe. Only three extant populations are known from rivers in Spain, Russia, and Albania. In the Vjosa River, we found the highest recorded abundance of P. pennigerum, and detected environmental DNA traces using a new assay. Our model predicts a high probability of the species' presence in downstream sections of the Vjosa River, and the population's abundance is related to environmental variables such as discharge and sediment dynamics. The population in the Vjosa River is crucial for the global survival of P. pennigerum.
INSECT CONSERVATION AND DIVERSITY
(2023)
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Francois Keck, Marjorie Couton, Florian Altermatt
Summary: The use of metabarcoding data for assessing biodiversity has become increasingly relevant in ecology, biodiversity sciences, and monitoring. Taxonomic identification of species from DNA sequences depends heavily on reference databases, which vary in completeness and availability. The incompleteness of reference databases is an important reason for the non-detection of species by metabarcoding. However, there are other commonly overlooked problems with reference databases that can result in false or inaccurate taxonomic assignments.
MOLECULAR ECOLOGY RESOURCES
(2023)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Roman Alther, Andrin Krahenbuhl, Pascal Bucher, Florian Altermatt
Summary: Amphipods play a crucial role in freshwater ecosystems and are widely used as model organisms in environmental sciences and ecotoxicology. This study successfully optimized breeding conditions for the amphipod Gammarus fossarum, increasing survival, reproduction, and multi-generation breeding. The supplementation of protein-rich food and provision of shelters significantly improved survival rate. Despite longer generation times and higher maintenance efforts compared to other model organisms, the direct ecological relevance and comparability of results may justify the use of G. fossarum in future research.
SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Nicky Lustenhouwer, Felix Moerman, Florian Altermatt, Ronald D. D. Bassar, Greta Bocedi, Dries Bonte, Sutirth Dey, Emanuel A. A. Fronhofer, Erika Garcez da Rocha, Andrea Giometto, Lesley T. T. Lancaster, Robert B. B. Prather Jr, Marjo Saastamoinen, Justin M. J. Travis, Carla A. A. Urquhart, Christopher Weiss-Lehman, Jennifer L. L. Williams, Luca Borger, David Berger
Summary: Experimental evolution studies can provide valuable proofs of concept that reinforce the links between theoretical predictions and empirical observations, advancing our understanding of the ecological and evolutionary consequences of dispersal.
JOURNAL OF ANIMAL ECOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Heng Zhang, Elvira Machler, Felix Morsdorf, Michael E. Schaepman, Florian Altermatt, Pascal A. Niklaus
Summary: Aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems are connected through spatial flows, integrating biodiversity and suggesting a spatial association. By combining satellite remote sensing and environmental DNA extraction from river water, a study reveals a spatial land-water fingerprint. The riverine eDNA diversity is found to be associated with the spectral diversity of terrestrial ecosystems upstream, peaking at a distance of 400 m and detectable up to a radius of 2.0 km. These findings provide important spatially explicit information for understanding land-water linkages.
SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Luca Carraro, Rosetta C. Blackman, Florian Altermatt
Summary: Due to the increasing threats to riverine ecosystems, there is a need for innovative approaches to assess biodiversity across different taxonomic groups and spatio-temporal scales. Recent advancements in using environmental DNA (eDNA) data and eDNA transport models in rivers have allowed for a comprehensive understanding of riverine biodiversity, supporting conservation efforts.
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Eva Cereghetti, Florian Altermatt
Summary: Biological assemblages result from dynamic processes with temporal and spatial dimensions. Understanding how organisms initially assembled and how they respond to environmental and biotic factors requires assessing changes through time and space. Small freshwater streams, often overlooked in favor of lakes and large streams, are significantly affected by human activities and biological invasions. In our study, we analyzed keystone shredder assemblages in 12 replicated small tributary streams over eight years, showing that changes in amphipod assemblages reflect colonization history and are influenced by terrestrial land use. Streams in agricultural landscapes displayed more pronounced temporal changes, highlighting the vulnerability of aquatic ecosystems to terrestrial drivers.
Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Eric Harvey, Justin N. Marleau, Isabelle Gounand, Shawn J. Leroux, Carina R. Firkowski, Florian Altermatt, F. Guillaume Blanchet, Kevin Cazelles, Cindy Chu, Cassidy C. D'Aloia, Louis Donelle, Dominique Gravel, Frederic Guichard, Kevin Mccann, Jonathan L. W. Ruppert, Colette Ward, Marie-Josee Fortin
Summary: The integration of ecosystem processes over large spatial extents is crucial for predicting the impacts of local and global changes on biodiversity and ecosystem functions. However, there is a significant gap in meta-ecosystem models in predicting multiple functions across different ecosystem types. This study presents a flexible meta-ecosystem model that incorporates the spatial dimension of natural systems to predict ecosystem functions at landscape extents.
Article
Ecology
Ester Premate, Spela Borko, Florian Altermatt, Cene Fiser
Summary: The performance of species depends on the interplay of their functional traits, which are influenced by natural selection and drive the evolution of functional diversity within a clade. In different habitats, interdependent functional traits form adaptive combinations that diversify within habitats and emerge as alternative combinations between habitats. The study tested these hypotheses using 185 species of subterranean amphipods, showing that realized a-FD within habitats is lower than without trait interdependence, while realized beta-FD between habitats is equal to or greater than null expectations. The results suggest the preserved potential for diversification within and between habitats.
FUNCTIONAL ECOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Zoology
Mara Knuesel, Spela Borko, Roman Alther, Alice Salussolia, Jean-Francois Flot, Florian Altermatt, Cene Fiser, Fabio Stoch
Summary: Subterranean fauna is understudied, including the Alpine groundwater amphipod Niphargus ruffoi. We assessed its taxonomic status using genetic markers and molecular species delimitation methods. The study revealed a complex scenario with two lineages (N. arolaensis and N. ruffoi), and suggested N. ruffoi as a species complex. Recombination and lack of morphological evidence made the resolution of the phylogenetic structure challenging. The study system provides insights into the evolution and biogeography of Alpine clades.
ZOOLOGISCHER ANZEIGER
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Lydian M. Boschman, Luca Carraro, Fernanda A. S. Cassemiro, Jorad de Vries, Florian Altermatt, Oskar Hagen, Carina Hoorn, Loic Pellissier
Summary: This study investigates the role of Andean mountain building and frequent river capture events in shaping the species richness pattern of freshwater fishes in South America, particularly in the western Amazon basin. The results show that these factors have led to highly dynamic freshwater habitats, resulting in high diversification rates and exceptional richness. The history of marine incursions and lakes also played a secondary role in the species richness pattern.
NATURE ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Sarah Mayor, Eric Allan, Florian Altermatt, Forest Isbell, Michael E. Schaepman, Bernhard Schmid, Pascal A. Niklaus
Summary: Numerous biodiversity-ecosystem functioning (BEF) experiments have shown that plant community productivity typically increases with species diversity. Additionally, research has found that the relationship between species diversity and functioning depends on the spatial scale considered, and ecological systems are hierarchically structured with additional biological variation.