Restoration ecology articles within Nature Communications

Featured

  • Article
    | Open Access

    International initiatives set ambitious targets for ecological restoration. Here, the authors conduct a meta-analysis to quantify the impacts of ecological restoration on greenhouse gas emissions and find that forest, grassland, and wetland restoration reduce global warming potential.

    • Tiehu He
    • , Weixin Ding
    •  & Quanfa Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Coral diseases are commonly sediment-associated. Here the authors conduct a field experiment in French Polynesia and Palmyra Atoll showing that removal of sea cucumbers that clean reef sediments while feeding increases coral disease.

    • Cody S. Clements
    • , Zoe A. Pratte
    •  & Mark E. Hay

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Forest restoration in LMICs can contribute to global C mitigation targets. Here, the authors assess the economic feasibility of forest restoration methods in Panama, i.e. natural regeneration, native species plantings, and enrichment planting, showing that not all methods are economically viable.

    • Katherine Sinacore
    • , Edwin H. García
    •  & Jefferson S. Hall

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Soil contamination is a pressing environmental concern due to increasing anthropogenic activity. Here, the authors developed a rapid and energy-efficient electrothermal process that simultaneously removes heavy metals and organic pollutants in soil.

    • Bing Deng
    • , Robert A. Carter
    •  & James M. Tour

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Conservation biologists have made calls for including human dimensions in wildlife conservation efforts. This quantitative synthesis of case studies from a global IUCN reintroduction program suggests that inclusion of local stakeholders in wildlife restoration programs boosts success rate.

    • Mitchell W. Serota
    • , Kristin J. Barker
    •  & Arthur D. Middleton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The capacity of coral reefs to keep pace with sea-level rise is central to their ability to continue to provide shoreline protection to vulnerable coastal communities. Here, the study shows that whereas restoration has the potential to minimize climate-change impacts, doing nothing will amplify them.

    • Lauren T. Toth
    • , Curt D. Storlazzi
    •  & Richard B. Aronson

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    Despite worldwide prevalence, post-agricultural landscapes remain one of the least constrained human-induced land carbon sinks. To appraise their role in rebuilding the planet’s natural carbon stocks through ecosystem restoration, we need to better understand their spatial and temporal legacies.

    • Stephen M. Bell
    • , Samuel J. Raymond
    •  & César Terrer

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mangrove forests protect communities from storms and support fisheries. Here, the authors show that the association with economic growth has shifted from negatively impacting mangroves to enabling mangrove expansion, and that community forestry is promoting mangrove expansion.

    • Valerie Hagger
    • , Thomas A. Worthington
    •  & Megan I. Saunders

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Postfire sagebrush seeding treatments are widely applied across the western USA but evidence for the success of this restoration approach has been variable. Examining >1500 wildfires, this study shows that positive treatment effects were only detected after considering systematic differences between treated and untreated sites due to effects of selection biases in restoration.

    • Allison B. Simler-Williamson
    •  & Matthew J. Germino

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Using a season-long field manipulation with an established model fish system on the Great Barrier Reef, this study demonstrates that limiting motorboat activity on reefs leads to faster growth and survival of more fish offspring compared to reefs experiencing busy motorboat traffic. Noise mitigation and abatement could therefore present a valuable opportunity for enhancing ecosystem resilience.

    • Sophie L. Nedelec
    • , Andrew N. Radford
    •  & Stephen D. Simpson

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    The COVID-19 lockdown reduced human mobility and led to immediate insights into how humans impact nature. Yet the strongest ecological impacts are likely to come. As we emerge from the pandemic, governments should avoid prioritizing short-term economic gains that compromise ecosystems and the services they provide humanity. Instead, the pandemic can be a pivot point for societal transformation to value longer term ecosystem and economic sustainability.

    • Amanda E. Bates
    • , Sangeeta Mangubhai
    •  & Valeria Vergara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Ambitious global targets exist for mangrove restoration. A meta-analysis reveals how mangrove restoration provides higher ecosystem benefits over unvegetated tidal flats, while generally lower than natural mangroves. Restoration outcomes, however, depend on restoration age, species and method.

    • Jie Su
    • , Daniel A. Friess
    •  & Alexandros Gasparatos

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Coastal restoration tends to be failure-prone and expensive. Temmink and colleagues improve seagrass and cordgrass transplant survival in field experiments using biodegradable structures which temporarily mimic self-facilitation occurring in mature vegetation stands, and combine onsite and laboratory measurements on sediment stability and stem movement to test the biophysical mechanisms.

    • Ralph J. M. Temmink
    • , Marjolijn J. A. Christianen
    •  & Tjisse van der Heide

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Healthy coral reefs have an acoustic signature known to be attractive to coral and fish larvae during settlement. Here the authors use playback experiments in the field to show that healthy reef sounds can increase recruitment of juvenile fishes to degraded coral reef habitat, suggesting that acoustic playback could be used as a reef management strategy.

    • Timothy A. C. Gordon
    • , Andrew N. Radford
    •  & Stephen D. Simpson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Random walk movement patterns with specific step size distributions are commonly associated with resource search optimization strategies in mobile organisms. Here, the authors show that clonal expansion of beach grasses follows a Lévy-type step size strategy that optimizes early dune building.

    • Valérie C. Reijers
    • , Koen Siteur
    •  & Tjisse van der Heide

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Rapid local adaptation could potentially facilitate the recolonization of restored habitats. Here, the authors show that reed warblers have undergone substantial adaptive change in body mass in only 19 years after colonizing a restored wetland in Malta.

    • Camilla Lo Cascio Sætre
    • , Charles Coleiro
    •  & Fabrice Eroukhmanoff

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Recovery of damaged ecosystems can vary in time and extent. Here, Moreno-Mateos and colleagues perform a meta-analysis to describe and quantify what they call recovery debt, an interim reduction in biodiversity, populations, and biogeochemical function of ecosystems during the recovery process.

    • David Moreno-Mateos
    • , Edward B. Barbier
    •  & José M. Rey Benayas

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Restoration of degraded ecosystems is known to enhance biodiversity and vegetation structure. Using a global meta-analysis, Crouzeilles et al. identify the drivers of restoration success in forest ecosystems at both the local and landscape scales.

    • Renato Crouzeilles
    • , Michael Curran
    •  & José M. Rey Benayas

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Forest recovery after past disturbances can help to understand how forests will respond to future scenarios. Here, the authors analyse palaeoecological records from tropical forests and find that Central American and African forests have recovered faster after disturbances than those in South America and Asia.

    • Lydia E. S. Cole
    • , Shonil A. Bhagwat
    •  & Katherine J. Willis

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