Academic Articles Mar. 2

Source: Scientists call on government to increase ambition to save our ocean

The latest academic papers on conservation. If you have a paper that you would like to share, please get in contact with us. Click on the title to follow the link to each article. Please note that some of these articles are behind a paywall.

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• Three lessons for gender equity in biodiversity conservation
  • Source: Conservation Biology
  • Author(s): Jacqueline D. Lau
  • Insights from feminist political ecology can help conservationists incorporate gender equity more reflexively.

• Ecological distinctiveness of birds and mammals at the global scale
  • Source: Global Ecology and Conservation
  • Author(s): Robert S.C. Cooke, Felix Eigenbrod, Amanda E. Bates 
  • Ecologically distinct species – species with distinct trait combinations – are not directly prioritized in current conservation frameworks. The consequence of this blind spot means species with the most distinct ecological strategies might be lost.

• Mangroves give cause for conservation optimism, for now
  • Source: Current Biology
  • Author(s): Daniel A. Friess et al.
  • An international team of researchers has found that globally, mangrove loss rates have reduced by almost an order of magnitude between the late 20th and early 21st century – from what was previously estimated at one to three per cent per year, to about 0.3 to 0.6 per cent per year, thanks in large part…

• Island building and overfishing in the Spratly Islands archipelago are predicted to decrease larval flow and impact the whole system
  • Source: Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science
  • Author(s): Eric Wolanski, Severine Choukroun, Nguyen HuuNhan
  • New research reveals the unseen environmental damage being done to coral reefs in the hotly contested South China Sea, as China and other nations jostle for control of the disputed sea lanes.

• Governance challenges for tropical nations losing fish species due to climate change
  • Source: Nature Sustainability
  • Author(s): Kimberly L. Oremus et al.
  • Climate change is driving fishery stocks out of their historical ranges. Along with the management challenge of species entering new jurisdictions, the exit of species from countries’ waters poses distinct threats to those resources and the economies that depend on them. 

• Linking ecosystem condition and landscape context in the conservation of ecosystem multifunctionality
  • Source: Biological Conservation
  • Author(s): Lucy A. Goodridge Gaines et al. 
  • Nature reserves are often implemented to restore the condition of habitats, protect populations of harvested species and to protect, as well as enhance, ecological functions. It is, however, not clear whether and how the spatial context of reserves influences their capacity to…

• Evaluating policy-relevant surrogate taxa for biodiversity conservation: a case study from British Columbia
  • Source: Canadian Journal of Zoology
  • Author(s): Sarah Falconer, Adam T. Ford
  • Conservation efforts often lead to a small proportion of species receiving a disproportionate amount of attention. This bias in finding may help or hinder broader goals of biodiversity conservation depending on the surrogacy value of the well-funded species.

• Biodiversity increases the efficiency of energy use in grasslands
  • Source: Nature Ecology and Evolution
  • Author(s): Oksana Y. Buzhdygan, Sebastian T. Meyer, Jana S. Petermann
  • Plants obtain their energy from the sun. Other beings rely on eating to survive. Yet how does the energy flow inside ecosystems function and are there differences between ecosystems with many species in comparison to those with few species? Researchers have now examined these questions using a holistic…

• Trends in protected area representation of biodiversity and ecosystem services in five tropical countries
  • Source: Ecosystem Services
  • Author(s): Rachel A. Neugarten
  • In late 2020, governments will set the next decade of conservation targets under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. Setting new targets requires understanding how…

• The Extraordinary Value of Wilderness Areas in the Anthropocene
  • Source: Reference Module in Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences
  • Author(s): James R. Allan, Hugh P. Possingham, Oscar Venter, Duan Biggs, James E. M. Watson
  • Humans have altered the majority of Earth’s terrestrial surface, yet some places still remain relatively undisturbed by modern society. These wilderness areas contain…