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.

Two analyses of developmental patterning functions of leg and wing genes in a crustacean provide complementary support for the incorporation of proximal leg components into the body wall during the crustacean–insect transition, but lead to duelling models for which portion(s) re-emerged from the body as wings.

Cranial variation in South African specimens of Paranthropus robustus illustrate temporal changes that suggest how the morphology of this hominin fossil species related to its palaeoenvironment and microevolutionary processes.

Global synchrony in tree growth shows a recent rapid rise tied to increasing temperature synchrony, which might alter global carbon sink dynamics.

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.

Ecological management strategies — from conservation to fisheries — require ecosystem-level thinking. This Review describes the main types of ecosystem model, how to select an appropriate model for a given application, and how to manage complexity and uncertainty.

The discovery of Minjinia turgenensis, a Palaeozoic stem-group jawed vertebrate with endochondral bone — a character long regarded as exclusive for bony fish and land vertebrates — changes our perception of bone formation evolution. It may also provide the first evidence for endochondral bone loss in cartilaginous fishes.

New evidence from over 4,600 studies calls into question the universal application of critical threshold values, or tipping points, along gradients of environmental stress. Identifying never-to-exceed environmental targets may prove elusive for environmental policy and management.

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.

An in-depth analysis of how pathogen prevalence among both bees and flowers changes over the course of a growing season reveals the complex dynamics of how infection risk changes with species diversity, abundance and phenology.

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.

The genome sequence of the algal species Prasinoderma coloniale reveals a novel phylum of green plants.

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.

Tree ring records show that sensitivity of conifer trees to drought has generally increased during the last century, but so has post-drought recovery.

Freshwaters are subject to a multitude of threats, but complex interactions among stressors are context-dependant and less common than expected.