Extinction risk from climate change
Chris D. Thomas,Alison Cameron,Rhys E. Green,Rhys E. Green,Michel Bakkenes,Linda J. Beaumont,Yvonne C. Collingham,Barend F.N. Erasmus,Marinez Ferreira de Siqueira,Alan Grainger,Lee Hannah,Lesley Hughes,Brian Huntley,Albert S. van Jaarsveld,Guy F. Midgley,Lera Miles,Lera Miles,Miguel A. Ortega-Huerta,A. Townsend Peterson,Oliver L. Phillips,Stephen E. Williams +20 more
TLDR
Estimates of extinction risks for sample regions that cover some 20% of the Earth's terrestrial surface show the importance of rapid implementation of technologies to decrease greenhouse gas emissions and strategies for carbon sequestration.Abstract:
Climate change over the past approximately 30 years has produced numerous shifts in the distributions and abundances of species and has been implicated in one species-level extinction. Using projections of species' distributions for future climate scenarios, we assess extinction risks for sample regions that cover some 20% of the Earth's terrestrial surface. Exploring three approaches in which the estimated probability of extinction shows a power-law relationship with geographical range size, we predict, on the basis of mid-range climate-warming scenarios for 2050, that 15-37% of species in our sample of regions and taxa will be 'committed to extinction'. When the average of the three methods and two dispersal scenarios is taken, minimal climate-warming scenarios produce lower projections of species committed to extinction ( approximately 18%) than mid-range ( approximately 24%) and maximum-change ( approximately 35%) scenarios. These estimates show the importance of rapid implementation of technologies to decrease greenhouse gas emissions and strategies for carbon sequestration.read more
Citations
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Targeting and evaluating biodiversity conservation action within fragmented landscapes: an approach based on generic focal species and least-cost networks
Kevin Watts,Amy E. Eycott,Phillip Handley,Duncan Ray,Jonathan W. Humphrey,Christopher P. Quine +5 more
TL;DR: This approach provides an assessment of landscape function by recognising the importance of the landscape matrix and provides a framework for the targeting and evaluation of alternative conservation options, offering a pragmatic, ecologically-robust solution to a current need in applied landscape ecology.
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Glorious past, uncertain present, bad future? Assessing effects of land-use changes on habitat suitability for a threatened farmland bird species
Mattia Brambilla,Fabio Casale,Valentina Bergero,Giuseppe Bogliani,G. Matteo Crovetto,Riccardo Falco,Michaela Roati,Irene Negri +7 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focused on the red-backed shrike as a model for investigating the effect of land abandonment on a threatened bird species, and used historical data to model dynamic scenarios.
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Ecological niche modelling and prioritizing areas for species reintroductions
TL;DR: In this article, two species for which reintroduction programmes are in the planning stages in Mexico: California condor Gymnogyps califor-nianus and Mexican wolf Canis lupus baileyi.
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Links between plant and fungal communities across a deforestation chronosequence in the Amazon rainforest
Rebecca C. Mueller,Fabiana S. Paula,Babur S. Mirza,Jorge L. M. Rodrigues,Klaus Nüsslein,Brendan J. M. Bohannan +5 more
TL;DR: Significant effects of land-use change on fungal community composition were found, which was more closely correlated to plant community composition than to changes in soil properties or geographic distance, providing evidence for strong links between above- and below-ground communities in tropical forests.
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Will bryophytes survive in a warming world
TL;DR: This review synthesizes information about the influence of environmental factors on bryophytes to understand their relation to climate, especially to temperature on a global scale, and discusses a range of critical topics, including the responses of photosynthetic activities to temperature changes, and the consequences of temperature change on the interactions between bryophical and vascular-plants, as well as on peatland ecosystems.
References
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Book
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