Incorporating biodiversity responses to land use change scenarios for preventing emerging zoonotic diseases in areas of unknown host-pathogen interactions

The need to reconcile food production, the safeguarding of nature, and the protection of public health is imperative in a world of continuing global change, particularly in the context of risks of emerging zoonotic disease (EZD). In this paper, we explored potential land use strategies to reduce EZD risks using a landscape approach. We focused on strategies for cases where the dynamics of pathogen transmission among species were poorly known and the ideas of “land-use induced spillover” and “landscape immunity” could be used very broadly. We first modeled three different land-use change scenarios in a region of transition between the Cerrado and the Atlantic Forest biodiversity hotspots. The land-use strategies used to build our scenarios reflected different proportions of native vegetation cover, as a proxy of habitat availability. We then evaluated the effects of the proportion of native vegetation cover on the occupancy probability of a group of mammal species and analyzed how the different land-use scenarios might affect the distribution of species in the landscape and thus the risk of EZD. We demonstrate that these approaches can help identify potential future EZD risks, and can thus be used as decision-making tools by stakeholders, with direct implications for improving both environmental and socio-economic outcomes

Data from: Is there a correlation between abundance and environmental suitability derived from ecological niche modelling? A meta-analysis

It is thought that species abundance is correlated with environmental suitability and that environmental variables, scale, and type of model fitting can confound this relationship. We performed a meta-analysis to (i) test whether species abundance is positively correlated with environmental suitability derived from correlative ecological niche models (ENM), (ii) test whether studies encompassing large areas within a species range (>50%) exhibited higher AS correlations than studies encompassing small areas within a species range (<50%), (iii) assess which modelling method provided higher AS correlation, and (iv) compare strength of the AS relationship between studies using only climatic variables and those that used both climatic and other environmental variables to derive suitability. We used correlation coefficients to measure the relationship between abundance and environmental suitability derived from ENM. Each correlation coefficient was considered an effect size in a random-effects multivariate meta-analysis. In all cases we found a significantly positive relationship between abundance and suitability. This relationship was consistent regardless of scale of study, ENM method, or set of variables used to derive suitability. There was no difference in strength of correlation between studies focusing on large or small areas within a species’ range or among ENM methods. Studies using other variables in combination with climate exhibited higher AS correlations than studies using only climatic variables. We conclude that occurrence data can be a reasonable proxy for abundance, especially for vertebrates, and the use of local variables increases the strength of the AS relationship. Use of ENMs can significantly decrease survey costs and allow the study of large-scale abundance patterns using less information. Including only climatic variables in ENM may confound the relationship between abundance and suitability when compared to studies including variables taken locally. However, modelers and conservationists must be aware that high environmental suitability does not always indicate high abundance

Ecology of small mammals in a Brazilian rural area

Submitted by Sandra Infurna ([email protected]) on 2019-10-10T12:59:30Z No. of bitstreams: 1 RosanaGentile_CarlosEGrelle_etal_IOC_1999.pdf: 2843021 bytes, checksum: 268ca81658bd9f1401cda77392967271 (MD5)Approved for entry into archive by Sandra Infurna ([email protected]) on 2019-10-10T13:06:33Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 RosanaGentile_CarlosEGrelle_etal_IOC_1999.pdf: 2843021 bytes, checksum: 268ca81658bd9f1401cda77392967271 (MD5)Made available in DSpace on 2019-10-10T13:06:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 RosanaGentile_CarlosEGrelle_etal_IOC_1999.pdf: 2843021 bytes, checksum: 268ca81658bd9f1401cda77392967271 (MD5) Previous issue date: 1999Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Departamento de Medicina Tropical. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Departamento de Ecologia. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Departamento de Ecologia. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Departamento de Ecologia. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Departamento de Medicina Tropical. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Departamento de Medicina Tropical. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Asmall mammal study was carried out in Pampanao valley, Sumidouro, State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,from June 1991 to July 1996. The area was characterised by small rmal propelties with vegetable plantations, pasture lands and small forest fragments. Small mammals were captured in seven line transects along the valley. Eleven small mammal species were captured: the didelphid marsupials Didelphis aurita, Philander !renata and Monodelphis americana, and the rodents Nectomys squamipes, Akodol/ cursor, OligOlyzomys nigripes, Bolomys lasiurus, Oecomys concolor (Sigmodontinae), Rattus rattus (Murinae), Proechimys iheringi and Euryzygomatomys guiara (Echimyidae). The heterogeneous habitat configuration probably allowed the occurrence of marsupials and more rodent species when compared to studies in monocu!ture areas

Correlation coefficients for the abundance-suitability relationship

In this file we provided the correlation coefficients between abundance and environmental suitability (column "best") for 450 species (column "species") obtained in thirty studies (column "author"). Sample size, type of niche (environmental or climatic), taxa (invertebrate, vertebrate or plant), family, type of method used to derive suitability (column "method"), and scale (large = >50% of a species range, small = <50% of a species range) are also provided

Incorporating biodiversity responses to land use change scenarios for preventing emerging zoonotic diseases in areas of unknown host-pathogen interactions

The need to reconcile food production, the safeguarding of nature, and the protection of public health is imperative in a world of continuing global change, particularly in the context of risks of emerging zoonotic disease (EZD). In this paper, we explored potential land use strategies to reduce EZD risks using a landscape approach. We focused on strategies for cases where the dynamics of pathogen transmission among species were poorly known and the ideas of “land-use induced spillover” and “landscape immunity” could be used very broadly. We first modeled three different land-use change scenarios in a region of transition between the Cerrado and the Atlantic Forest biodiversity hotspots. The land-use strategies used to build our scenarios reflected different proportions of native vegetation cover, as a proxy of habitat availability. We then evaluated the effects of the proportion of native vegetation cover on the occupancy probability of a group of mammal species and analyzed how the different land-use scenarios might affect the distribution of species in the landscape and thus the risk of EZD. We demonstrate that these approaches can help identify potential future EZD risks, and can thus be used as decision-making tools by stakeholders, with direct implications for improving both environmental and socio-economic outcomes

Indirect effects of habitat loss via habitat fragmentation: A cross-taxa analysis of forest-dependent species

Recent studies suggest that habitat amount is the main determinant of species richness, whereas habitat fragmentation has weak and mostly positive effects. Here, we challenge these ideas using a multi-taxa database including 2230 estimates of forest-dependent species richness from 1097 sampling sites across the Brazilian Atlantic Forest biodiversity hotspot. We used a structural equation modeling approach, accounting not only for direct effects of habitat loss, but also for its indirect effects (via habitat fragmentation), on the richness of forest-dependent species. We reveal that in addition to the effects of habitat loss, habitat fragmentation has negative impacts on animal species richness at intermediate (30–60%) levels of habitat amount, and on richness of plants at high (>60%) levels of habitat amount, both of which are mediated by edge effects. Based on these results, we argue that dismissing habitat fragmentation as a powerful force driving species extinction in tropical forest landscapes is premature and unsafe

NEOTROPICAL ALIEN MAMMALS: a data set of occurrence and abundance of alien mammals in the Neotropics

Biological invasion is one of the main threats to native biodiversity. For a species to become invasive, it must be voluntarily or involuntarily introduced by humans into a nonnative habitat. Mammals were among first taxa to be introduced worldwide for game, meat, and labor, yet the number of species introduced in the Neotropics remains unknown. In this data set, we make available occurrence and abundance data on mammal species that (1) transposed a geographical barrier and (2) were voluntarily or involuntarily introduced by humans into the Neotropics. Our data set is composed of 73,738 historical and current georeferenced records on alien mammal species of which around 96% correspond to occurrence data on 77 species belonging to eight orders and 26 families. Data cover 26 continental countries in the Neotropics, ranging from Mexico and its frontier regions (southern Florida and coastal-central Florida in the southeast United States) to Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, and Uruguay, and the 13 countries of Caribbean islands. Our data set also includes neotropical species (e.g., Callithrix sp., Myocastor coypus, Nasua nasua) considered alien in particular areas of Neotropics. The most numerous species in terms of records are from Bos sp. (n = 37,782), Sus scrofa (n = 6,730), and Canis familiaris (n = 10,084); 17 species were represented by only one record (e.g., Syncerus caffer, Cervus timorensis, Cervus unicolor, Canis latrans). Primates have the highest number of species in the data set (n = 20 species), partly because of uncertainties regarding taxonomic identification of the genera Callithrix, which includes the species Callithrix aurita, Callithrix flaviceps, Callithrix geoffroyi, Callithrix jacchus, Callithrix kuhlii, Callithrix penicillata, and their hybrids. This unique data set will be a valuable source of information on invasion risk assessments, biodiversity redistribution and conservation-related research. There are no copyright restrictions. Please cite this data paper when using the data in publications. We also request that researchers and teachers inform us on how they are using the data