{"title":"The velocity of fire-regime shifts.","authors":"Dale G Nimmo, Eamonn I F Wooster","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.08.002","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.08.002","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Fire regimes are shifting worldwide, yet no common framework describes their direction, rate, or ecological effects. We introduce fire-regime velocity, the rate and direction of movement through a multidimensional fire-regime state space. By linking velocity to adaptive responses, the framework can help predict the consequences of fire-regime shifts for population persistence.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"908-911"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148881710","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J Y Jeon, A J Mularo, N M Allen, E J Heenkenda, J W Bickham, A N Black, J A DeWoody
{"title":"Genomic metrics should inform formal conservation threat assessments.","authors":"J Y Jeon, A J Mularo, N M Allen, E J Heenkenda, J W Bickham, A N Black, J A DeWoody","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.015","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.015","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Whole-genome resequencing data, associated metrics, and their trends over time can be used to inform extinction threat rankings rendered by conservation agencies around the world. Surveys of individual genome sequences can critically address risks to population sustainability by means of key metrics such as heterozygosity. Genomic metrics have yet-unrealized potential to help authorities determine how a given population or species of conservation concern should be formally categorized (e.g., 'listed' or 'delisted') with respect to discrete threat categories. To stimulate productive discourse, we provide a general heuristic framework for how genomic metrics could be used to refine conservation threat assessments (e.g., to help determine whether species should be listed or not).</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"963-973"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148537099","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Cambrian fecal revolution: Fueling the Cambrian Radiation.","authors":"Julien Kimmig, Russell D C Bicknell","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.013","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.013","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Coprolites-fossil material extruded from an animal's digestive system-represent a rare insight into trophic interactions in deep time. However, while the first animals appeared about 600 million years ago, the first coprolites are only observed in the earliest Cambrian. Conversely, in modern oceans, fecal pellets are an important part of the particulate organic carbon in the water column and the global flux of organic carbon to deep water. In this review, we analyze the impact of the advent of fecal matter on the Cambrian Radiation by examining coprolites, analyzing animal biology, and contextualizing this through the role of fecal pellets in the oceanic nutrient cycle. We illustrate the central position of coprolites in driving the Cambrian Radiation.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"986-998"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148702230","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Rethinking plasticity in fungal resilience and ecosystem functioning.","authors":"Amit Kumar, Ido Rog, John Klironomos","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.07.006","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.07.006","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Fungi are widely recognized as phenotypically plastic, a characteristic often invoked to explain the persistence of ecosystem functions under disturbance. How plasticity varies across taxa remains a key question. Emerging evidence implies species-specific, phylogenetically structured responses, with the strongest divergence under environmental extremes, making fungal community composition essential to ecosystem functioning.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"904-907"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148702307","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Human, natural, and artificial intelligence in forest restoration.","authors":"Pedro H S Brancalion, Marcelo P L Medeiros","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.08.008","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.08.008","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Forest restoration has to move beyond attempts to rebuild complex ecosystems and instead focus on creating the conditions for their self-organization. Artificial intelligence can support this transition by expanding human capacity to navigate complexity, but if applied uncritically, it could reinforce the very biases it is intended to overcome.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"895-898"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148907069","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Arnaud Estoup, Philip E Hulme, Kathryn A Hodgins, Mathieu Gautier, Eric Lombaert, Manpreet K Dhami, Angela McGaughran, Ruth A Hufbauer
{"title":"Can habitat modification in the native range promote invasion?","authors":"Arnaud Estoup, Philip E Hulme, Kathryn A Hodgins, Mathieu Gautier, Eric Lombaert, Manpreet K Dhami, Angela McGaughran, Ruth A Hufbauer","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.006","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.006","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The anthropogenically induced adaptation to invade (AIAI) hypothesis posits that selection in human-modified habitats within native ranges can adapt populations to invade similarly altered environments elsewhere. Although widely invoked, empirical tests of this hypothesis remain limited because disentangling native-range adaptation from post-introduction evolution is challenging. Here, we clarify how anthropogenic disturbance creates repeatable selective regimes and demonstrate how targeted sampling, population genomics, and genotype-environment associations can disentangle native-range adaptation from post-introduction evolution. Incorporating genomic offset, genetic architecture, nongenetic changes, experiments, and temporal data further strengthens inference. These insights and approaches establish the AIAI hypothesis as a mechanism that explicitly links human disturbance with the evolutionary dynamics of invasive species, providing novel insights into the prediction and management of biological invasions.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"938-951"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148382930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Luca Rindi, Alexander H McGrath, Ezequiel M Marzinelli, Lisandro Benedetti-Cecchi
{"title":"The host-microbiome dimension of ecological regime shifts.","authors":"Luca Rindi, Alexander H McGrath, Ezequiel M Marzinelli, Lisandro Benedetti-Cecchi","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.004","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.004","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Rising climate and local pressures increase the risk of regime shifts, yet despite progress, thresholds remain difficult to identify early enough to take action. We argue that this shortfall reflects a host-centric view that largely omits host-associated microbiomes, which can shape resilience by modulating stress tolerance, aiding recovery, and stabilizing alternative states through inhibitory chemical interactions. We propose a research agenda that integrates host-associated microbiomes into regime-shift ecology by combining novel microbiome manipulations in laboratory and field settings with regime-shift mapping tools, while simultaneously developing microbiome-based early warning indicators. Reframing regime-shift theory through a host-associated microbiome lens can provide practical tools to anticipate collapse, improve monitoring, and inform timely interventions, thereby supporting more adaptive and robust conservation under accelerating global change.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"924-937"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148370071","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Succession as a unifying model of ecosystem ecology and conservation.","authors":"Jacob E Allgeier, Donald R Zak","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.007","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.007","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Succession is a fundamental concept in ecology because it provides perspectives on how ecosystems change over time and respond following disturbance. It is also a useful concept for conservation and restoration because human activity has increased the frequency and magnitude of disturbances globally. Ecosystem ecology offers a unique perspective on succession because it views dynamics through the lens of process-based currencies-such as net ecosystem production-that subsume multiple simultaneous properties of energy and nutrient flow, thereby providing a useful measure with which to monitor and anticipate net change. Studying succession through these perspectives reveals fundamental patterns that unify central principles of ecosystem ecology and provide a predictive model on which to base conservation and restoration efforts.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"974-985"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148814132","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Sijia Yuan, Yuhao Zhao, Jean-Philippe Lessard, Thomas E Martin, Thomas J Matthews, Xingfeng Si
{"title":"Rebuilding the species pool within a phylogenetic framework.","authors":"Sijia Yuan, Yuhao Zhao, Jean-Philippe Lessard, Thomas E Martin, Thomas J Matthews, Xingfeng Si","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.009","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.06.009","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The species pool is a fundamental concept with the potential to connect ecological and evolutionary processes in community ecology and biogeography. However, current definitions of the concept primarily focus on contemporary ecological processes, ignoring the historical and evolutionary processes that generated the species pool. We propose a phylogenetic framework that defines the species pool by inferring evolutionary connectivity between communities in a biogeographic region. Our framework is better suited to addressing questions regarding assembly processes occurring over long time periods, offering deeper evolutionary insights for community ecology and conservation biogeography.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":"952-962"},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148424580","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Fernando Morales-Rueda, Jorge Castro, Karen D Holl
{"title":"Improving the promise of drone seeding for restoration.","authors":"Fernando Morales-Rueda, Jorge Castro, Karen D Holl","doi":"10.1016/j.tree.2026.09.004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2026.09.004","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Drone seeding is expanding as a restoration tool, yet evidence of ecological effectiveness remains limited and outcomes are highly variable. Our synthesis of global initiatives suggests drone seeding should target landscapes where conventional restoration is constrained and ecological conditions support seedling recruitment. Standardized monitoring and reporting of outcomes are essential.</p>","PeriodicalId":23274,"journal":{"name":"Trends in ecology & evolution","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":17.9,"publicationDate":"2026-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149149737","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}