Biological Reviews最新文献

Urbanisation is a key driver of global environmental change and presents animals with novel stressors and challenges. It can fundamentally influence social behaviour and has the potential to reshape within- and between-species social interactions. Given the role of social behaviour in reproductive fitness and survival, understanding how social interactions change in response to urban conditions is crucial in addressing individual-, population-, and species-level responses to urbanisation, as well as the consequential ecological impacts. Here, we conducted the first systematic review addressing the impact of urbanisation on social systems and interspecific interactions. We synthesise the outcomes of the 227 studies from our literature search, organised across three key topics: (i) effects of urban stressors on social behaviour (N = 170), (ii) social system responses to urban environments (N = 75), and (iii) the impact of urbanisation on interspecific interactions (N = 12). Our review revealed that urbanisation is having a substantial impact on multiple facets of social behaviour, with 92% of studies finding a significant impact. We also identified several biases and gaps in the current literature. For example, 62% of all studies were conducted on birds, and 85% of studies testing urban stressors focused on anthropogenic noise. Given the diversity of animal social systems, there is obvious variation in social responses to urban conditions. However, we offer predictions for how social systems might change as urban environments continue to expand rapidly and suggest guidelines for future research to enhance generalisations across taxa. Our review brings together multiple areas of research, provides timely insights and outlines a framework for a unified and proactive approach to addressing social responses to urbanisation. This represents an essential foundation for anticipating species' responses to urban expansion and guiding effective conservation efforts.

Echolocating bats display a large repertoire of behavioural plasticity, with vocal flexibility as a core constituent. The speed and accuracy of vocal adjustments executed by echolocating bats are unparalleled by other mammals, including humans. However, the evolutionary pressures behind the extraordinary vocal flexibility of echolocating bats remains elusive. Here we conducted a synthetic review to evaluate critically the probable drivers for all forms of vocal flexibility in echolocating bats. We show that many forms of bat echolocation flexibility, accounting for approximately 60% of vocal adjustment behaviours, function to mitigate acoustic interference, and thus can be attributed to auditory masking. Importantly, half of these anti-interference strategies are related to reafferent masking that is specific to active-sensing animals. We propose that auditory masking mitigation represents a strong selection pressure for the remarkable repertoire of vocal flexibility in echolocating bats.

Decision-making is a central function of adaptive behaviour in biological agents. However, strategies for adaptive decision-making can vary substantially across species. Here, we aim to extend the comparative scope of decision-making analyses to phylogenetically diverse organisms. To do so, we introduce the Continual Decision Making Dynamics (CDMD) framework, which characterises decision-making as a temporally extended, history-sensitive process that is sustained by self-organising and self-regulating interactions. Drawing on empirical examples, we demonstrate how CDMD can accommodate the organisation of control architectures that support more distributed and decentralised modes of decision-making, and facilitate a comparative approach to decision-making strategies across phylogenetic and organisational scales. We discuss how our model can be situated among other related approaches to decision-making, capturing a distinctive subset of decision strategies that can be modelled in the absence of explicit representational structures. Our framework contributes to integrative approaches that bridge biological complexity and cognitive modelling, and highlights how regulatory control and organisational constraints shape decision-making dynamics across a broader range of biological systems.

The global redistribution of species through human agency is one of the defining ecological signatures of the Anthropocene, with biological invasions reshaping biodiversity patterns, ecosystem processes and services, and species interactions globally. Here, we review the facets underlying the spread of non-native species - the key process by which introductions translate into large-scale invasions. In particular, we synthesise the ecological, evolutionary, and anthropogenic mechanisms underpinning the spread of non-native species, highlighting how dispersal, recruitment, and establishment interact across spatial and temporal scales. We examine the dynamics of non-native species spread in animals, plants, fungi, and pathogens, as well as across terrestrial, freshwater, and marine realms, with particular attention to the dynamics and processes modulating spread. We further evaluate essential phenomena of non-native species spread, such as the role of invasion fronts, Allee effects, propagule pressure, interactions with environmental change, landscape properties, and biotic interactions. We then outline how spread can be measured, modelled, and predicted using tools ranging from classical diffusion models to cutting-edge Artificial Intelligence and individual-based simulations. By offering a cross-system and cross-scale synthesis, this review advances the theoretical and practical understanding of non-native species spread for supporting policy and management.

Insect odorant receptors (ORs) are a class of chemoreceptors that insects use to detect volatile cues in their environment. In recent years, major advances in the field of structural biology have made it possible to obtain the first structures of insect ORs. In this review, we place molecular evidence of OR function into the context of their three-dimensional structure, focusing on both tuning ORs and their co-receptor, Orco, as well as their interaction. We also used AlphaFold2 to model the structures of several deorphanized receptors and mapped the experimentally identified residues important for function, revealing putative functional hotspots. We discuss several efficient methods for functional evolution studies and propose emerging technologies that may open avenues for further research and innovation.

For over a century, palaeopathology has been used as a tool for understanding evolution, disease in past communities and populations, and to interpret behaviour of extinct taxa. Physical traumas in particular have frequently been the justification for interpretations about aggressive and even competitive behaviours in extinct taxa. However, the standards used in these interpretations have been inconsistent and occasionally questionable, and knowledge of extant reptile pathology is limited. Interpretations about the timelines and causes of unhealed bone damage are unreliable, and so behavioural implications from these marks are dubious. Even in the case of tooth marks, perimortem damage can be difficult to distinguish from postmortem alteration. In this review, methods from the anthropological sciences are adapted for the purposes of palaeontology, especially in establishing a new framework to distinguish antemortem traumatic damage from other similarly presenting features like sediment encrustation, postmortem damage/taphonomic features, variants of anatomical features, and non-traumatic palaeopathologies. Even in cases where traumatic palaeopathologies are accurately macroscopically identified, noting isolated incidences may not provide sufficient evidence to interpret behaviour at any taxonomic level. Future research directions in modern reptile pathology are proposed to improve the efficacy of traumatic palaeopathologies as a tool in interpreting extinct reptile behaviours.

Parasites exist in every ecosystem, affecting nearly all organisms and playing a complex role in human societies. On the one hand, they contribute substantially to biodiversity and support ecosystem stability by performing essential ecological functions. On the other, they can impose health burdens on their hosts, causing diseases in both animals and humans. Despite their significance, our understanding of how parasitic organisms are affected by human-driven environmental change remains poor. In other well-studied groups such as free-living birds, mammals and insects, long-term ecological data sets have been instrumental in elucidating temporal trends in abundance or diversity and linking them to anthropogenic drivers. For parasites however, overarching long-term trends in infection levels or diversity have yet to be identified. Here we provide an overview of the research approaches developed to study long-term changes in parasite systems and the trends highlighted by these studies. Our aims were to help researchers make informed methodological decisions when designing their research, and to provide recommendations for future long-term research on parasite ecology. To this end, we performed a systematic literature search on long-term analyses of eukaryotic parasites of wild animals and identified four types of approaches deployed to gather long-term data: (i) long-term monitoring; (ii) snapshot resampling; (iii) literature-based research; and (iv) natural history collection-based studies. Our results revealed striking differences in the temporal scope, geographical scale of sampling, sample sizes and taxonomic resolution of parasite identification among these approaches. However, no overarching trends in parasite infection levels or diversity were identified. When detected, significant temporal changes were often linked to anthropogenic disturbances, but these claims were rarely supported by inferential analyses. Overall, our results show that our understanding of long-term trends in parasite systems remains hampered by data scarcity and research biases. To address these issues, we advocate for the establishment of large-scale parasite monitoring programmes combined with existing ecological monitoring projects, as well as the development of new scalable biomonitoring tools. We also highlight the importance of valorising historical data and preserved biological material in museum collections to obtain baseline information on parasite systems.

Turtles are among the most imperilled vertebrate groups, with over 50% of the world's turtle species at risk of extinction due to a range of environmental and anthropogenic challenges. Despite the apparent persistence of many turtle species owing to their long adult lifespans, high early-life mortality can contribute to population declines by disrupting juvenile recruitment and preventing the replacement of aging adults. For long-lived species that are already slow to recover from declines, reduced recruitment can further delay population recovery, underscoring the need for continued research in this area. Preventing further turtle extinctions requires targeted conservation across all life stages, yet efforts are hindered by gaps in understanding the drivers of recruitment failure and the most effective management strategies. Common threats to recruitment include predation and climate change pressures; however, less-frequently cited factors, such as environmental contamination and food availability, may also play significant roles. For recruitment-enhancing strategies like nest protection, habitat restoration, and predator management to be effective, they must be tailored to the most pressing threats facing the managed turtle population and designed to align with available resources. Strategies should be both feasible to implement and scaled appropriately to match the severity and extent of the threats they aim to address. Integrating targeted interventions to mitigate recruitment loss with broader conservation efforts - such as improving food availability and reducing human impacts - is critical for reversing population declines and ensuring long-term species persistence. Here, we synthesise current knowledge on the barriers to juvenile recruitment, evaluate the efficacy and limitations of existing conservation measures, and identify critical priorities for future research and management.