Frontiers in Zoology最新文献

{"title":"Earlier hatching date rather than chick phenotypic quality enhances first-year survival in the black-headed gull.","authors":"Piotr Indykiewicz,Julia Barczyk,Jarosław Kowalski,Piotr Minias","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00605-6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-026-00605-6","url":null,"abstract":"BACKGROUNDFavourable conditions experienced during early ontogeny are expected to positively influence individual performance at later stages of the life cycle and determine lifetime fitness. In this study, we investigated whether early-life (chick) phenotypic quality (body condition and immunocompetence) and hatching date are associated with post-fledging survival in the black-headed gull Chroicocephalus ridibundus. To this end, we quantified size-corrected body mass, total blood haemoglobin concentration, and PHA-induced immune response in more than 500 colour-marked gull chicks in Poland. We then analysed their first-year survival rates using capture-recapture models based on extensive resighting data collected across Europe.RESULTSNeither better body condition (body mass and haemoglobin concentration) nor higher immunocompetence during rearing significantly improved post-fledging (first year of life) survival rate. In contrast, post-fledging survival was primarily determined by hatching date, as early-hatched chicks showed enhanced survival rates than those hatched late in the season. The positive effect of early hatching on post-fledging survival was apparent despite lower phenotypic quality of those early-hatched chicks.CONCLUSIONSOur study identifies hatching date as the key determinant of post-fledging survival in the black-headed gull. We suggest that the cumulative negative effects of delayed (suboptimal) hatching and fledging in black-headed gulls may outweigh any benefits of elevated condition and immunocompetence at the natal stage, ultimately compromising post-fledging survival. We propose that our findings may be explained by varying levels of temporal (mis)synchronization between peak food availability and key stages of the annual cycle, particularly the early post-fledging period. The study adds to the understanding of the carry-over effects between the successive stages of the life cycle in wild colonial birds.","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":"88 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147471401","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"An integrative taxonomic approach reveals unexplored diversity in Croatian planarians.","authors":"Miquel Vila-Farré, Jeremias N Brand, Tobias Boothe, Maren Brockmeyer, Fruzsina Ficze-Schmidt, Markus A Grohme, Uri Weill, Kasper H Kluiver, Ludwik Gąsiorowski, Lucija Kauf, Yuliia Kanana, Helena Bilandžija, Marta Riutort, Jochen C Rink","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00603-8","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-026-00603-8","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Freshwater ecosystems are among the most endangered habitats on Earth, with approximately one-fourth of aquatic species at risk of extinction. Effective conservation efforts require comprehensive monitoring and accurate species identification, including often overlooked groups. Planarian flatworms are one such group that, although commonly present in freshwater ecosystems worldwide, remains understudied even in species-rich areas, e.g. Croatia. As a result, the true extent of planarian diversity often remains underappreciated.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>With the goal of characterising the Croatian planarian diversity, we used an integrative approach combining barcoding and classical taxonomy methods. Motivated by the highly skewed representation of planarian diversity in current GenBank records of the barcoding gene cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI), we first optimised primer design and amplification protocols. Applying these approaches to field-collected material from Croatia, we substantially expanded the number of taxonomically curated COI barcode sequences for European dugesiids, dendrocoelids and planariids. In addition, our efforts resulted in the description of a new pigmented Dendrocoelum species, Dendrocoelum pigmentatum Vila-Farré, sp. nov., the discovery of two highly differentiated haplotypic clades in Schmidtea lugubris, and the rediscovery of Polycladodes alba in Croatia after a century.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Overall, our effort integrates Croatia as an underexplored but planaria species-rich region into the endeavour to systematically describe the planarian fauna of Europe. The expansion of a known number of Croatian planarian species from eight to sixteen and the discovery of a new, large planarian species in continental Europe, Dendrocoelum pigmentatum, demonstrate the effectiveness of our integrative approach. Overall, our work highlights the underappreciated diversity of planarians, even in continental Europe and supports practical conservation efforts to preserve aquatic biodiversity.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-03-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13067409/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147470166","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessing the invasive risk of Rhinotermitidae in China under current and future global warming scenarios using the MaxEnt model.","authors":"Riaz Hussain, Lianxi Xing, Yuan Hua","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00600-x","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-026-00600-x","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Biodiversity and distribution patterns are essential components for ecological and biogeographical research. The family Rhinotermitidae (sensu lato; Coptotermes and Reticulitermes) is among the most detrimental and widespread termites in China, causing severe damage to the ecosystem. However, their geographical distribution patterns and species richness hotspots are little comprehended, posing substantial challenges for successful management and control initiatives. After cleaning, along with bioclimatic variables, we uploaded 215 occurrence records for Coptotermes and 184 for Reticulitermes to the MaxEnt model to forecast their risk habitats during the Current (1970-2000) period and under prospective global warming scenarios.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>We found that Coptotermes are mainly distributed in southern China, while Reticulitermes are primarily found in southern China and the Qinling Mountains. The hotspots of Coptotermes are primarily located in Guangdong Province, while those of Reticulitermes are located in Hubei and Guangdong Provinces. Annual mean temperature (Bio1; 73.2%) is mainly responsible for the distribution of Coptotermes in China, while mean diurnal range (Bio2; 31%) and precipitation of driest quarter (Bio17; 31.4%) are mainly affecting the distribution of Reticulitermes. The MaxEnt model exhibited outstanding performance for Coptotermes (AUC 0.955; TSS 0.808) and Reticulitermes (AUC 0.944; TSS 0.732). Under climate scenarios from 1970 to 2000, the total risk areas of Coptotermes and Reticulitermes were 0.73 million km² and 2.25 million km², respectively. Under SSP2-4.5 scenarios, areas classified as negligible-, moderate-, and high-risk are expected to expand and shift towards northern China in the future, leading to a rise in Rhinotermitidae (sensu lato) population size. Therefore, it indicates a serious threat to infrastructure, crops, and agricultural systems.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>This research enhances our knowledge about the present geographic distribution and species richness hotspots of Coptotermes and Reticulitermes in China and the potential impact of future global warming on their distribution and shift towards novel habitats in southern and northern China. Therefore, this study aids in the implementation of control and early prevention strategies in high-risk regions.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-02-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13032235/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146777022","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Males have a greater mite burden than females, and size does not matter: species- and sex-specific infestation patterns of mites (Uropodina) on burying beetles (Nicrophorus spp.).","authors":"Daria Bajerlein, Piotr Zduniak, Aleksandra Wyszyńska, Edward Baraniak, Marek Przewoźny, Tomasz Grzegorczyk, Arkadiusz Urbański","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00601-w","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-026-00601-w","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Phoretic mites and their carriers represent a dynamic system shaped by ecological and evolutionary processes. In highly specific phoresy, which involves long-term or permanent associations, profound consequences for phoretics, including cospeciation or the transition to phoretic parasitism, can occur. Mites within the complex of cryptic species of Uroobovella nova are carried exclusively on burying beetles (Nicrophorus spp.). Nevertheless, compared with the Poecilochirus mite-Nicrophorus system, this type of interaction remains poorly understood. In this study, we investigated whether different species of burying beetles play the same role in the local dispersal of U. nova deutonymphs. To achieve this, we compared the infestation patterns of deutonymphs among field-collected beetle species, while accounting for sex and body size.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Our results revealed species-specific patterns in deutonymph infestations, with Nicrophorus vespillo being the most frequently infested species, followed by N. humator and N. interruptus. Furthermore, Nicrophorus vespillo and N. humator hosted the greatest number of deutonymphs, whereas in N. interruptus, the number of carried mites was significantly lower. The infestation pattern of U. nova demonstrated significant sexual bias, with males exhibiting higher mite prevalence and intensity than females. Interestingly, the variation in host body size was not a significant predictor of U. nova infestation. Although more mites were attached to the anterior than to the posterior parts of the beetle body in all the examined species, species- and sex-specific patterns in the distribution of deutonymphs were evident.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Species-specific infestation patterns indicate that, at the local scale, individual burying beetle species play different roles in the dispersal of U. nova mites. Sex-specific infestation patterns suggest that biological differences between females and males may be key determinants of deutonymph infestations. Body size does not drive the prevalence, intensity, or distribution of deutonymphs. The assumption that larger hosts carry more symbionts does not hold universally in ecology.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-02-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13020040/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146229991","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Morphology of male genitalia, legs, and wing venation reveals the classification of Mesozoic Zoraptera (Insecta).","authors":"Petr Kočárek, Ivona Kočárková, Robin Kundrata","doi":"10.1186/s12983-025-00595-x","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-025-00595-x","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The current classification of extant Zoraptera is based on the results of molecular phylogeny combined with the morphology of male genitalia and supplemented by the characters on the male abdomen and the number of metatibial spurs. However, fossil representatives of Zoraptera have not yet been classified into the modern system, and most of them remain in the catch-all genus Zorotypus Silvestri, 1913, because the genitalia are either not observable or have not been examined in detail. In this study, for the first time, we describe and critically evaluate the male genitalia and other principal diagnostic characters of all available Mesozoic Zoraptera. Our results have led to the first proposal of a generic classification of Mesozoic Zoraptera. We describe two new genera, Cretozoros gen. nov. and Burmazoros gen. nov., reinstate Paleospinosus Kaddumi, 2005, stat. restit. from synonymy with the subgenus Octozoros Engel, 2003 (in Zorotypus), and elevate Octozoros Engel, 2003 to the genus level. Cretozoros gen. nov., Paleospinosus Kaddumi, 2005, stat. restit., and Octozoros stat. nov. are classified in Spiralizoridae: Latinozorinae, whereas Burmazoros gen. nov. and Xenozorotypus Engel & Grimaldi, 2002 are classified in Zorotypidae: Zorotypinae. Altogether, it was possible to classify nine of the 11 currently recognized species of Mesozoic Zoraptera. To evaluate the phylogenetic relationships of fossil zorapterans, including the newly established taxa, we estimated the evolutionary histories of selected morphological features using ancestral character state reconstruction. The classification of Mesozoic Zoraptera within the modern system enables us to better understand the early evolution of this insect order.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-02-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12977874/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146137942","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Where the wolf roams: ecological preferences and wild prey association in a changing Mediterranean landscape.","authors":"Maria Buglione, Domenico Fulgione, Tiziano Trasmondo, Benedetta De Francesco, Gabriele de Filippo, Eleonora Rivieccio","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00598-2","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-026-00598-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The wolf (Canis lupus) is a species of great conservation interest and has recently highlighted management challenges throughout Europe. Over the past 50 years, the establishment of National Parks, forest cover changes as well as the expansion of wild ungulates seem to have played a crucial role in shaping the demographic trend of the wolf. We investigated prey-predator associations in the Cilento, Vallo di Diano e Alburni National Park (Southern Italy), one of the most ecologically significant areas contributing to the recovery of wolf in Southern Apennine. During the wolf bottleneck in the 70's, the protected area hosted only a few wolves and wild prey were scarce, while nowadays the wolf population has exceeded two hundred individuals, the wild boar number has increased significantly, and both roe deer and red deer are steadily rising following reintroduction actions. We aim to examine the relationship between the wolf population and its three primary wild prey considering the environmental changes that have occurred over the past few decades to underpin the current and future complex ecological relationships in Mediterranean forest ecosystems. Overall, our study lays the groundwork for future management strategies aimed at reconciling large carnivore conservation with sustainable forest use and human-wildlife coexistence.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-02-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12973744/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146127602","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Transcriptomic basis underlying the evolution of female horn plasticity in scarab beetles.","authors":"Cuicui Qi, Wenqing Zhang, Yonggang Hu","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00597-3","DOIUrl":"10.1186/s12983-026-00597-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Exaggerated traits in insects often evolve through nutrition-sensitive growth, yet studies have focused largely on male exaggeration widespread in nature, leaving the developmental and evolutionary basis of female exaggeration and the extent to which plasticity differs between sexes poorly understood.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Here, we investigated the transcriptomic basis of female horn plasticity in three Onthophagus beetles that differ in horn morphology and nutritional responsiveness. Phylogenetic analyses indicate that rudimentary female horns represent the ancestral condition, with exaggerated, nutrition-sensitive horns evolving in derived lineages. Comparative transcriptomics reveal that enhanced female horn plasticity arises primarily through the recruitment and modulation of conserved regulatory networks, with limited contributions from taxon-restricted genes. Despite the shared reliance on conserved modules in two species with enhanced female horn plasticity, the transcriptional repertoires underlying horn plasticity are largely lineage-specific. In O. rectecornutus, where both sexes bear exaggerated horns, sex comparisons demonstrate that males and females rely on the expression of largely distinct gene sets, with only a small fraction of shared nutrition-responsive genes.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Together, our results show that exaggerated female horns arise through a mosaic of conserved and lineage-specific regulatory mechanisms, with strong sex bias in transcriptional control. More generally, our findings highlight how conserved developmental toolkits can be rewired in lineage- and sex-specific ways to evolve novel, plastic, and exaggerated traits.</p>","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-02-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12973629/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146127599","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"International workshop report on \"Animal resilience and organismal response to environmental change: insights from basal metazoans\", Tutzing (Germany), 22-25 September 2025.","authors":"Kim L de Luca,Yamini Ravichandran,Melanie Dörr,Christian R Voolstra","doi":"10.1186/s12983-025-00592-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-025-00592-0","url":null,"abstract":"The 2025 Tutzing Workshop, held at the Evangelische Akademie on the shores of Lake Starnberg, continued a long tradition of highly integrative meetings focused on the biology and evolution of basal metazoans. The meeting was organized by Christian R. Voolstra (University of Konstanz, Germany) and Ulrich Technau (University of Vienna, Austria), with kind support from the German Research Foundation (DFG). Building on the successful 2023 event, this year's symposium brought together close to 100 participants from Europe, North America, Asia, and Australia, representing newest research and scientific insight ranging from molecular evolution and functional genomics to ecology, developmental biology, and symbiosis. The central theme \"Animal resilience and organismal response to environmental change: insights from basal metazoans\" reflects an ongoing effort to leverage early-branching animals such as cnidarians (hydrozoans, anemones, jellyfish, corals), sponges, and ctenophores to address fundamental questions about the origins of multicellularity, the mechanisms of tissue regeneration, and the processes by which organisms adapt to environmental change. The symposium was structured around thematic sessions, poster presentations, roundtable discussions, and an invited keynote lecture. Scientific highlights included new genome assemblies, advances in single-cell transcriptomics, insights into epigenetic regulation and transposable element activity, as well as exciting discoveries about nervous system evolution, biomechanics of tissue regeneration, and immune responses in cnidarians. Beyond the empirical advances, the meeting fostered interdisciplinary discussion and outlined clear priorities for future collaborative research.","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":"4 1","pages":"4"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-01-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146042487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Photoperiodic regulation of Wnts in spermatogenesis of Brandt's vole (Lasiopodomys brandtii).","authors":"Lijuan Zhao,Jiajia Shi,Yan Liu,Lewen Wang,Junping Zhao,Yuhua Shi,Hong Sun,Dawei Wang,Zhenlong Wang","doi":"10.1186/s12983-026-00596-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-026-00596-4","url":null,"abstract":"Photoperiod regulates spermatogenesis in seasonal breeders, yet its molecular mechanisms remain unclear. The Wnt signaling pathway is critical for spermatogenesis in non-seasonal breeders, but its role in photoperiodic spermatogenesis in seasonal breeders is unexplored. To investigate this, we exposed male Brandt's voles (Lasiopodomys brandtii), a strict seasonal breeder, to long-photoperiod (LP, 16L:8D) and short-photoperiod (SP, 8L:16D) from the embryonic stage. Testis volume was markedly larger in LP than in SP from 4 to 10 weeks after birth. RNA-seq analysis of 151 Wnt pathway genes revealed differential expression, with Wnt5a, Wnt6, Wnt7a, and Wnt9a downregulated and Wnt7a upregulated in LP compared to SP. RT-qPCR and Western blotting confirmed these patterns. Immunofluorescence analysis showed that WNT7A and WNT9A were localized to pachytene and diplotene spermatocytes at 4 weeks and to elongating spermatid heads at 10 weeks. WNT6 and WNT5A appeared as perinuclear foci in early spermatocytes at 4 weeks, with WNT6 subsequently shifting to spermatid nuclei at 10 weeks. These findings indicate that prenatal and postnatal photoperiodic exposure, potentially mediated through both maternal and direct pathways, is associated with distinct spatiotemporal expression patterns of WNT5A, WNT6, WNT7A, and WNT9A, suggesting their potential involvement in seasonal reproduction.","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146015429","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Urbanization and landscape effects on taxonomic and functional wild bee diversity in small towns and rural areas.","authors":"Weronika Banaszak-Cibicka,Łukasz Dylewski,Joanna Bajon,Joanna T Białas,Monika Fliszkiewicz","doi":"10.1186/s12983-025-00594-y","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-025-00594-y","url":null,"abstract":"BACKGROUNDPlanning and managing urban landscapes for greater biodiversity and creating effective conservation strategies requires understanding the relationships between biodiversity and different types of urbanization. Here, we described the variation between small-town and rural areas in two dimensions of biodiversity - taxonomic and functional. We compared community composition and alpha and beta diversity levels of bees between small town and rural sites. We also analyzed the impact of landscape composition on bee communities.RESULTSOur results showed that bee abundance, species richness, Shannon-Wiener diversity index, and functional alpha diversity parameters did not differ between small towns and rural areas. Taxonomical overall beta diversity also did not show significant differences between the areas studied. However, we found higher taxonomical turnover and lower taxonomical nestedness for bees in urban areas than in rural areas. Simultaneously, the functional overall beta diversity was higher in rural than urban areas. Moreover, the results showed negative relationships between bees' abundance and species richness with the density of impervious surface area (ISA) and cropland cover.CONCLUSIONSOur results show that even very small towns can influence bee communities, causing decrease in dissimilarity at the functional level, and landscape changes such as increased urbanization and crop cover have a significant negative impact on bees.","PeriodicalId":55142,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Zoology","volume":"167 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-12-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145732597","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}