Biogeography is the scientific study of the spatial and temporal patterns of biodiversity, examining how and why the distributions of species, populations, communities, and ecosystems vary across geographical areas and through evolutionary time. It integrates principles from ecology, evolution, geology, and climatology to analyze processes such as dispersal, speciation, extinction, vicariance, and range shifts. Biogeography encompasses subfields including historical biogeography, which reconstructs past distributions using phylogenetic and paleontological data, and ecological biogeography, which investigates how current environmental gradients, habitat structure, and biotic interactions shape present-day distributional patterns and biodiversity gradients, such as latitudinal diversity clines and island faunas.
An international research team led by the University of Vienna has produced, for the first time, high-resolution global maps of invasion risk for thousands of alien plant species under current conditions and future climate ...
Plants & Animals
Mar 27, 2026
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22
With almost a third of cacti species threatened with extinction, a new open-access database of cactus ecology and evolution could help scientists and conservationists save species from the brink.
Plants & Animals
Mar 25, 2026
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10
Biological invasions are a major driver of biodiversity loss and invasive pollinators can reshape native plant-pollinator networks. A new study published in the journal NeoBiota reveals that invasive pollinators are fundamentally ...
Plants & Animals
Mar 23, 2026
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121
The Indo-Pacific is the largest marine biogeographical region on Earth and a global center of marine biodiversity. Nevertheless, there are gaps remaining in our understanding of the diversity, distribution, and endemism of ...
Ecology
Mar 17, 2026
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8
A research team led by scientists at the Butantan Institute in São Paulo, Brazil, has completed the most extensive genetic sequencing of a jararaca viper to date. The focus of the study was the genome of the golden lancehead ...
Evolution
Mar 11, 2026
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41
As its name suggests, the common buzzard is one of Europe's most familiar birds of prey, often spotted perched on fence posts scanning for mice and worms, or performing spectacular loop dives over fields to attract mates. ...
Plants & Animals
Mar 10, 2026
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20
Why does a Caribbean angelfish sometimes resemble its Indo-Pacific cousin, even though they have never lived in the same ocean? Why do coral reefs harbor such a wide range of stripes, spots and patterns? A study conducted ...
Evolution
Mar 5, 2026
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22
At newly colonized high-elevation sites in the central Italian Apennines, female Daubenton's bats take turns using the same hunting spots instead of feeding side by side. A study published by a research team from the University ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 27, 2026
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26
Suitable habitat for migrating monarch butterflies will shift southwards because of climate change, according to a study published in PLOS Climate by Francisco Botello and Carolina Ureta at the National Autonomous University ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 25, 2026
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17
The Japanese beetle (Popillia japonica) is one of the most dreaded insects to have invaded North America and parts of Europe. Accidentally introduced to the United States in the early twentieth century, it can now be found ...
Ecology
Feb 25, 2026
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14
