Reviews & Analysis

Five key criteria are proposed to demonstrate robustly that temperature-mediated phenological asynchrony will negatively impact consumers, which the authors show are rarely met in the current literature.

Outlining a conceptual framework of climate-driven fast, slow and abrupt ecological change that integrates palaeoecology, contemporary ecology and invasion biology, the authors argue that the focus of theory and practice needs to shift from managing states to managing rates of change.

Systematic reviews are a powerful tool to synthesize large volumes of the published literature, but are susceptible to a number of methodological biases. Here, the authors outline mitigation strategies for improving the quality of evidence syntheses.

There is an urgent need to ensure that marine ecosystems are able to support biodiversity and the services they sustain in the face of rapid global change. Here, the authors argue that a holistic approach of integrated ocean management can ensure a sustainable and resilient ocean economy.

Tulloch details a six-step timeline that improves ecology and conservation conference inclusion by embedding diversity and equity into planning, financing, marketing, scientific and social scheduling, evaluation and reporting.

In Africa, COVID-19 has created a perfect storm of reduced funding, restrictions on the operations of conservation agencies, and elevated human threats to nature. This Perspective discusses solutions to move beyond this immediate crisis.

Vaccines that can spread autonomously through animal populations could help to prevent zoonoses before they spillover into humans. This Perspective discusses the epidemiological theory and the practical challenges associated with transmissible and transferable vaccines.

Recent institutional and vertebrate conservation scientists’ publication data suggest that China has a growing conservation research capacity deficit. Here the authors outline steps China must take to build up this capacity in order to safeguard the country’s exceptionally rich biodiversity.

This Perspective uses a social–ecological systems framework to make recommendations for global targets that capture the interdependencies of biodiversity, ecosystem services and sustainable development to inform the Convention on Biological Diversity post-2020 process and the future of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

This Perspective discusses the microbial metacommunity of animal social groups, and the social and environmental forces that shape it at different levels, from individuals to species.

Urbanization can cause rapid evolutionary responses among city-dwelling species but evolution is rarely accounted for in urban conservation efforts. Here, the authors outline a framework for integrating evolutionary principles into the management of urban biodiversity.

The postdoctoral experience is in need of reform. Here the authors outline concrete steps that institutions, postdocs and mentors can take to improve the landscape.

Ecosystem restoration needs to incorporate network and evolutionary approaches to focus on long-term recovery of the complexity of ecosystems.

Anthropogenic sensory pollutants, such as noise, light and chemicals, are affecting biodiversity. This Perspective uses an understanding of animal sensory ecology to explore how these impacts can be mitigated.

A decentralized community is introduced that aims to standardize and integrate species trait data across organismal groups, based on principles of Open Science.

Expert elicitation methods identify a set of essential ecological variables that may be used to guide effective conservation and management of the deep sea.

Time lags in the response of species to conservation interventions may mask success. In this Perspective, the authors explore the effects of time lags on biodiversity indicators using both theory and empirical data.