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Categories: Ecology: Research, Paleontology: Fossils

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Researchers show that rising temperatures in northern regions may damage peatlands: critical ecosystems for storing carbon from the atmosphere -- and could decouple vital processes in microbial support systems.

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For tiny salamanders squirming skin-to-soil, big-picture weather patterns may seem as far away as outer space. But for decades, scientists have mostly relied on free-air temperature data at large spatial scales to predict future salamander distributions under climate change. The outlook was dire for the mini ecosystem engineers, suggesting near elimination of habitat in crucial areas.

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Today, ants are pretty much everywhere. To learn more about how these insects conquered the world, scientists used a combination of fossils, DNA, and data on the habitat preferences of modern species to piece together how ants and plants have been evolving together over the past 60 million years. They found that when flowering plants spread out from forests, the ants followed, kicking off the evolution of the thousands of ant species alive today.

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The Indo-West Pacific is the largest marine ecosystem on Earth, but scientists who study its diversity have to contend with a problem so well-known it was remarked upon by Charles Darwin: related species in the IWP have similar appearances, making it difficult to assess just how many there are. A new study reveals that nearly identical crab species have one consistently distinguishing feature, which only evolves when their ranges overlap.

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Ancient 2m-long amphibians swam like crocodiles long before true crocodiles existed, according to a new study.

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Solving the climate crisis and biodiversity crisis are not separate issues. Animals remove billions of tons of carbon dioxide each year. Restoring species will help limit global warming, new science reveals.

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In North America's hottest, driest desert, climate change is causing the decline of plants once thought nearly immortal and replacing them with shorter shrubs that can take advantage of sporadic rainfall and warmer temperatures.

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A new discovery changes ideas about the origin of branching in plants.

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The success of North American crops from corn to Christmas trees partly depends on a relatively invisible component of the food web -- ground beetles. Nearly 2,000 species of ground beetle live in North America. New research shows that some of these insects could thrive while others could decline as the climate changes. The team found that the response will largely depend on the species' traits and habitats and could have significant implications for conservation efforts.

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Research has revealed that diversity in genes coding for immunity may have facilitated adaptation to farming lifestyles in prehistoric periods.

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Is nitrate responsible for algae, flowers, and even your neighbors? A team of geoscientists have unearthed evidence that may indicate yes.

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Fewer parasites in U.S. waters might be seen by many as a good thing, but a biologist says the trend signals potential danger for fish and other wildlife.

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A new study explores a record of birds' diets preserved in their feathers and radio tracking of their movements to find that birds eat far fewer invertebrates in coffee plantations than in forests, suggesting that the disturbance of their ecosystem significantly impacts the birds' dietary options.

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Leading edge technology has uncovered secrets about a world-renowned fossil hoard that could offer vital clues about early life on Earth. Researchers who analyzed the 400 million-year-old cache, found in rural north-east Scotland, say their findings reveal better preservation of the fossils at a molecular level than was previously anticipated.

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Intense fishing and over-exploitation have led to evolutionary changes in fish stocks like cod, reducing both their productivity and value on the market. These changes can be reversed by more sustainable and far-sighted fisheries management. A new study shows that reversal of evolutionary change would only slightly reduce the profit of fishing, but would help regain and conserve natural genetic diversity.

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There's been a well-documented shift toward earlier springtime flowering in many plants as the world warms. The trend alarms biologists because it has the potential to disrupt carefully choreographed interactions between plants and the creatures -- butterflies, bees, birds, bats and others -- that pollinate them.

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Geneticists have written new chapters in the reconstruction of pre-colonial Americas history after using DNA from the indigenous Ashaninka people from Amazonian Peru. They have discovered previously unexpected levels of genetic variation in this group and uncovered a strong hint that these people were involved in a South-to-North migration that led to the transition from an archaic to ceramic culture in the Caribbean islands.

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Populations of whooper swans grow 30 times faster inside nature reserves, new research shows.

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Dramatic differences between shallow and mesophotic reefs stress the importance of studying--and conserving--these vital ecosystems along their entire depth gradient.

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An analysis extending from southern Portugal to northern Norway highlights the importance of temperature in determining where fish species are found.