Species diversity is a multidimensional ecological concept describing the variability of species within a community, typically quantified through measures that integrate both species richness (the number of species) and evenness (the relative abundances of those species). It underpins community structure, ecosystem functioning, and resilience by influencing processes such as resource use, trophic interactions, and stability against perturbations. Species diversity is often assessed using alpha diversity (within-community), beta diversity (turnover among communities), and gamma diversity (regional diversity), and is commonly measured with indices such as Shannon, Simpson, or Hill numbers, each emphasizing different aspects of richness and evenness.
New research shows that maintaining and adopting proposed marine protected areas (MPAs) in the Southern Ocean could almost double the protection of genetic hotspots from 28% to about 54%. These actions would stave off an ...
Ecology
Feb 18, 2026
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Up to 30% of bird diversity hotspots, places where large numbers of different bird species occur, in the western United States face threats from high-severity wildfires in the future that could eliminate critical forest habitats, ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 18, 2026
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An ecosystem is not a still life. Even where everything looks stable—a woodland, a lake, the soil—the internal "bookkeeping" keeps changing: how many individuals belong to which species, and for how long. Some populations ...
Evolution
Feb 18, 2026
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A global study has revealed the conditions under which non-native plants thrive in the world's many dryland regions and the factors that limit their spread. Using data from 98 study sites across 25 countries on six continents, ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 17, 2026
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At high densities, white-tailed deer inhibit growth of trees but increase the overall diversity of smaller plant and weed species, according to a long-term study published recently. The work is published in the journal PLOS ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 16, 2026
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A new national monitoring program provides, for the first time, area-representative knowledge of semi-natural grasslands in Norway. The results show that this habitat covers a larger area than previously mapped, but that ...
Ecology
Feb 16, 2026
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15
Most people think of microbes in simple terms: Some make you sick, while others help keep you healthy. But microbes' influence stretches far beyond human bodies. These astonishingly complex organisms regulate the health of ...
Ecology
Feb 13, 2026
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The Yangtze River Basin, a global biodiversity hotspot, has endured severe ecological degradation over several decades due to intense human activity, leading to a marked decline in aquatic biodiversity. In order to halt this ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 12, 2026
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107
Farmers now have more reasons to consider rotating their crops, University of Alberta research shows. Widely used to restore soil health, the agricultural practice boosts the diversity of bacterial and fungal microbes that ...
Ecology
Feb 10, 2026
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A research team has conducted a study to examine how shelterbelts influence bird species diversity and composition in an agricultural wetland landscape on the western coast of central Japan. They determined that shelterbelts, ...
Ecology
Feb 10, 2026
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