9 research outputs found

    Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

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    Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

    Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

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    Amazonia Camtrap: a data set of mammal, bird, and reptile species recorded with camera traps in the Amazon forest.

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    Abstract : The Amazon forest has the highest biodiversity on Earth. However, information on Amazonian vertebrate diversity is still deficient and scatteredacross the published, peer-reviewed, and gray literature and in unpublishedraw data. Camera traps are an effective non-invasive method of surveying vertebrates, applicable to different scales of time and space. In this study, we organized and standardized camera trap records from different Amazonregions to compile the most extensive data set of inventories of mammal,bird, and reptile species ever assembled for the area. The complete data setcomprises 154,123 records of 317 species (185 birds, 119 mammals, and13 reptiles) gathered from surveys from the Amazonian portion of eightcountries (Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Peru,Suriname, and Venezuela). The most frequently recorded species per taxawere: mammals:Cuniculus paca (11,907 records); birds: Pauxi tuberosa (3713 records); and reptiles:Tupinambis teguixin(716 records). The infor-mation detailed in this data paper opens up opportunities for new ecological studies at different spatial and temporal scales, allowing for a moreaccurate evaluation of the effects of habitat loss, fragmentation, climatechange, and other human-mediated defaunation processes in one of themost important and threatened tropical environments in the world. The data set is not copyright restricted; please cite this data paper when usingits data in publications and we also request that researchers and educator sinform us of how they are using these data

    Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

    Get PDF
    Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5,6,7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8,9,10,11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases.13,14,15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

    Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

    Get PDF
    Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time, and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space. While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes, vast areas of the tropics remain understudied. In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity, but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases. To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge, it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

    Giants of the Amazon: How does environmental variation drive the diversity patterns of large trees?

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    For more than three decades, major efforts in sampling and analyzing tree diversity in South America have focused almost exclusively on trees with stems of at least 10 and 2.5 cm diameter, showing highest species diversity in the wetter western and northern Amazon forests. By contrast, little attention has been paid to patterns and drivers of diversity in the largest canopy and emergent trees, which is surprising given these have dominant ecological functions. Here, we use a machine learning approach to quantify the importance of environmental factors and apply it to generate spatial predictions of the species diversity of all trees (dbh ≥ 10 cm) and for very large trees (dbh ≥ 70 cm) using data from 243 forest plots (108,450 trees and 2832 species) distributed across different forest types and biogeographic regions of the Brazilian Amazon. The diversity of large trees and of all trees was significantly associated with three environmental factors, but in contrasting ways across regions and forest types. Environmental variables associated with disturbances, for example, the lightning flash rate and wind speed, as well as the fraction of photosynthetically active radiation, tend to govern the diversity of large trees. Upland rainforests in the Guiana Shield and Roraima regions had a high diversity of large trees. By contrast, variables associated with resources tend to govern tree diversity in general. Places such as the province of Imeri and the northern portion of the province of Madeira stand out for their high diversity of species in general. Climatic and topographic stability and functional adaptation mechanisms promote ideal conditions for species diversity. Finally, we mapped general patterns of tree species diversity in the Brazilian Amazon, which differ substantially depending on size class

    Giants of the Amazon:How does environmental variation drive the diversity patterns of large trees?

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    Amazonia camtrap: A dataset of mammal, bird, and reptile species recorded with camera traps in the Amazon forest.

    Get PDF
    The Amazon forest has the highest biodiversity on earth. However, information on Amazonian vertebrate diversity is still deficient and scattered across the published, peer-reviewed and grey literature and in unpublished raw data. Camera traps are an effective non-invasive method of surveying vertebrates, applicable to different scales of time and space. In this study, we organized and standardized camera trap records from different Amazon regions to compile the most extensive dataset of inventories of mammal, bird and reptile species ever assembled for the area. The complete dataset comprises 154,123 records of 317 species (185 birds, 119 mammals and 13 reptiles) gathered from surveys from the Amazonian portion of eight countries (Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela). The most frequently recorded species per taxa were: mammals - Cuniculus paca (11,907 records); birds - Pauxi tuberosa (3,713 records); and reptiles - Tupinambis teguixin (716 records). The information detailed in this data paper opens-up opportunities for new ecological studies at different spatial and temporal scales, allowing for a more accurate evaluation of the effects of habitat loss, fragmentation, climate change and other human-mediated defaunation processes in one of the most important and threatened tropical environments in the world. The dataset is not copyright restricted; please cite this data-paper when using its data in publications and we also request that researchers and educators inform us of how they are using this data. [Abstract copyright: This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
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