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Biodiversity time series from temperate regions reveal that marine communities in warmer places gain species but lose individuals with warming, but colder environments show weaker trends, whereas no systematic relationships between biodiversity and temperature change were detectable for terrestrial communities.
By analysing pooled whole-genome sequences from two species of Darwin’s finches, both before and after interbreeding and back-crossing, the authors show that gene exchange between the two species is asymmetric and female biased.
Laboratory and modelling studies show that temperature conditions can enhance the capacity of malaria to infect mosquitoes that feed in the evening compared with those that feed at midnight or in the morning.
Using historic measles epidemiological data from England and Wales in a competing-risks framework, the authors find that metapopulation aggregation in neighbouring towns and cities played an important role in driving national dynamics in the prevaccination era.
Analysis of transcripts in hybrids of two closely related sea urchins with divergent developmental gene expression suggests limited pleiotropic effects of mutations that contribute to divergence in gene expression.
The loss of biodiversity at the global scale has been difficult to reconcile with observations of no net loss at local scales. Vegetation surveys across European temperate forests show that this may be explained by the replacement of small-ranged species with large-ranged ones, driven by nitrogen deposition.
Modelling nonlinear habitat dynamics shows that delayed compensation of human impacts (‘no net loss’) will lead to biodiversity declines by the middle of the century. Instead, the authors recommend fixed targets (such as ‘zero loss’) as part of the post-2020 biodiversity framework.
Experimental evolution shows that host–plasmid coevolution in the presence of antibiotics promoted the emergence of multidrug resistance via two distinct conjugative plasmids in communities of Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae once antibiotics were removed.
In 355 coastal coral reef fish species, body size changed with warming, but the direction of a species’ body size response to warming through time was generally consistent with its response to temperature changes through space, rather than generally negative.
A genome assembly of the sterlet, Acipenser ruthenus, reveals a whole-genome duplication early in the evolution of the entire sturgeon lineage and provides details about the rediploidization of the genome.
Combining a large-scale manipulative field experiment with long-term genetic assays and modelling, the authors document evidence of ecological–evolutionary feedbacks between aphids and parasitoids through resistance conferred by heritable bacterial symbionts.
Species with ranges that span international borders pose particular challenges for conservation management. Here, the authors develop an index of transboundary feasibility, and identify regions of the world with high conservation potential across national borders.
Evolutionary analysis of transcriptomes across Metazoa supports a scenario of ancestral adult stages and a single intercalation event at the origin of larvae.
Experimental evolution in male seed beetles subjected to different levels of natural and sexual selection reveals that trade-offs between naturally and sexually selected fitness components can increase mutation rate.
This study uses isolated eye–brain preparations to show topographic visual and somatosensory representation in the lamprey pallium, which is similar to the basic sensorimotor representation of the mammalian neocortex.
It is unclear whether between-male relatedness modulates the intensity of intrasexual competition. A combination of modelling and empirical testing supports a kin-selected strategy of male–male competition in Trinidadian guppies.
Analysing phenotypic and genomic differences between urban and rural lizards, the authors identify a single non-synonymous polymorphism associated with heat tolerance plasticity that may explain how urban lizards can endure higher temperatures compared to those in forests.