The Historic Role of Humans and Other Keystone Species in Shaping Central Hardwood Forests for Disturbance-Dependent Wildlife

2016 ◽  
pp. 319-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cathryn H. Greenberg ◽  
Kendrick Weeks ◽  
Gordon S. Warburton
Keyword(s):  
Keystone Species ◽  
Hardwood Forests

scholarly journals Molecular Hydrogen, a Neglected Key Driver of Soil Biogeochemical Processes

2019 ◽  
Vol 85 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Piché-Choquette ◽  
Philippe Constant
Keyword(s):  
Energy Requirement ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Physiological Role ◽  
Atp Synthesis ◽  
Potential Contribution ◽  
Biogeochemical Processes ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
C Cycling ◽  
The Impact

ABSTRACTThe atmosphere of the early Earth is hypothesized to have been rich in reducing gases such as hydrogen (H2). H2has been proposed as the first electron donor leading to ATP synthesis due to its ubiquity throughout the biosphere as well as its ability to easily diffuse through microbial cells and its low activation energy requirement. Even today, hydrogenase enzymes enabling the production and oxidation of H2are found in thousands of genomes spanning the three domains of life across aquatic, terrestrial, and even host-associated ecosystems. Even though H2has already been proposed as a universal growth and maintenance energy source, its potential contribution as a driver of biogeochemical cycles has received little attention. Here, we bridge this knowledge gap by providing an overview of the classification, distribution, and physiological role of hydrogenases. Distribution of these enzymes in various microbial functional groups and recent experimental evidence are finally integrated to support the hypothesis that H2-oxidizing microbes are keystone species driving C cycling along O2concentration gradients found in H2-rich soil ecosystems. In conclusion, we suggest focusing on the metabolic flexibility of H2-oxidizing microbes by combining community-level and individual-level approaches aiming to decipher the impact of H2on C cycling and the C-cycling potential of H2-oxidizing microbes, via both culture-dependent and culture-independent methods, to give us more insight into the role of H2as a driver of biogeochemical processes.

scholarly journals Keystone species and food webs

2009 ◽  
Vol 364 (1524) ◽  
pp. 1733-1741 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ferenc Jordán
Keyword(s):  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Interspecific Interactions ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Ecosystem Functions ◽  
General Interest ◽  
Interaction Structure ◽  
Structure And Dynamics ◽  
Rich Interaction ◽  
Natural Communities

Different species are of different importance in maintaining ecosystem functions in natural communities. Quantitative approaches are needed to identify unusually important or influential, ‘keystone’ species particularly for conservation purposes. Since the importance of some species may largely be the consequence of their rich interaction structure, one possible quantitative approach to identify the most influential species is to study their position in the network of interspecific interactions. In this paper, I discuss the role of network analysis (and centrality indices in particular) in this process and present a new and simple approach to characterizing the interaction structures of each species in a complex network. Understanding the linkage between structure and dynamics is a condition to test the results of topological studies, I briefly overview our current knowledge on this issue. The study of key nodes in networks has become an increasingly general interest in several disciplines: I will discuss some parallels. Finally, I will argue that conservation biology needs to devote more attention to identify and conserve keystone species and relatively less attention to rarity.

The Cultural Importance of Floristic Diversity: A Case Study from Nokopo village, Madang and Morobe Provinces, Papua New Guinea

1998 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 107-122
Author(s):  
Christin Kocher-Schmid
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Natural Processes ◽  
The People ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Aesthetic Concepts

AbstractBiodiversity is not exclusively a product of pristine natural processes but is also, to a considerable degree, caused by human activities. This is demonstrated by a detailed inspection of the use and classification of plants by the people of Nokopo village in the Finisterre Range of Papua New Guinea. Nokopo people recognise and value biodiversity on all its levels - genetic diversity, species diversity and diversity of ecosystems - and their activities enhance overall biodiversity. This can be partly explained by the usefulness biodiversity has to them, in terms of resource access and other utilitarian considerations. On the other hand, aesthetic concepts and values make a significant contribution. Both these intrinsically interwoven components - the utilitarian and the aesthetic component respectively - form the base for understanding the major role humans play in creating and maintaining biodiversity, the role of keystone species enhancing overall biodiversity in a given ecosystem.

A host-endoparasite network of Neotropical marine fish: are there organizational patterns?

Parasitology ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 138 (14) ◽  
pp. 1945-1952 ◽  
Author(s):  
SYBELLE BELLAY ◽  
DILERMANDO P. LIMA ◽  
RICARDO M. TAKEMOTO ◽  
JOSÉ L. LUQUE
Keyword(s):  
Marine Fish ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Ecological Networks ◽  
Interaction Patterns ◽  
Low Degree ◽  
Organizational Patterns ◽  
Host Parasite ◽  
Species Segregation

SUMMARYProperties of ecological networks facilitate the understanding of interaction patterns in host-parasite systems as well as the importance of each species in the interaction structure of a community. The present study evaluates the network structure, functional role of all species and patterns of parasite co-occurrence in a host-parasite network to determine the organization level of a host-parasite system consisting of 170 taxa of gastrointestinal metazoans of 39 marine fish species on the coast of Brazil. The network proved to be nested and modular, with a low degree of connectance. Host-parasite interactions were influenced by host phylogeny. Randomness in parasite co-occurrence was observed in most modules and component communities, although species segregation patterns were also observed. The low degree of connectance in the network may be the cause of properties such as nestedness and modularity, which indicate the presence of a high number of peripheral species. Segregation patterns among parasite species in modules underscore the role of host specificity. Knowledge of ecological networks allows detection of keystone species for the maintenance of biodiversity and the conduction of further studies on the stability of networks in relation to frequent environmental changes.

Litter decomposition in earthworm-invaded northern hardwood forests: Role of invasion degree and litter chemistry

Ecoscience ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 536-544 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew R. Holdsworth ◽  
Lee E. Frelich ◽  
Peter B. Reich
Keyword(s):  
Litter Decomposition ◽  
Hardwood Forests ◽  
Litter Chemistry ◽  
Northern Hardwood Forests ◽  
Northern Hardwood

scholarly journals Dialogical Relationships and the Bear in Indigenous Poetry

Sibirica ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 114-120
Author(s):  
Stephan Dudeck
Keyword(s):  
Native American ◽  
North America ◽  
Boreal Forest ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Forest Zone ◽  
Human Relationships ◽  
Indigenous Poetry

The essay provides a review of a small but remarkable book on the work of two important Native American and Siberian poets, Meditations after the Bear Feast by Navarre Scott Momaday and Yuri Vella, published in 2016 by Shanti Arts in Brunswick, Maine. Their poetic dialogue revolves around the well-known role of the bear as a sociocultural keystone species in the boreal forest zone of Eurasia and North America. The essay analyzes the understanding of dialogicity as shaping the intersubjectivity of the poets emerging from human relationships with the environment. It tries to unpack the complex and prophetic bear dream in one of Vella’s poems in which he links indigenous ontologies with urgent sociopolitical problems.

scholarly journals Harlequin Ducks (Histrionicus histrionicus) Scavenge Sea Urchin Fragments from Foraging Sea Otters (Enhydra lutris)

2016 ◽  
Vol 130 (2) ◽  
pp. 91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin Rechsteiner ◽  
Angeleen Olson
Keyword(s):  
Red Sea ◽  
Sea Urchins ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Sea Otter ◽  
Enhydra Lutris ◽  
Sea Otters ◽  
Important Prey ◽  
Histrionicus Histrionicus ◽  
Harlequin Ducks

Foraging animals may risk association with potential predators to obtain otherwise inaccessible prey. We observed this strategy in wintering Harlequin Ducks (Histrionicus histrionicus) scavenging fragments of Red Sea Urchins (Mesocentrotus franciscanus) from foraging Sea Otters (Enhydra lutris) that were re-occupying an area from which they had been ecologically absent since about 1850. Harlequin Ducks, like other sea ducks, have not previously been reported scavenging from other birds or mammals. In British columbia, Red Sea Urchins have reached large sizes and densities since the removal of Sea Otter predators by the marine fur trade in the 18th and 19th centuries. Observations of Sea Otters and Harlequin Ducks were made in 4 areas, spanning a time gradient of Sea Otter occupation from 1 to 5 years. During 3 months of observations (December 2013 – February 2014), Harlequin Ducks were associated with foraging Sea Otters only at sites that were recently occupied by Sea Otters (≤ 2 months), where the proportion of urchins in Sea Otter diets was highest and where the ducks acquired urchin fragments from foraging Sea Otters. We suggest that Sea Otters re-occupying their historic range and consuming predominantly large Red Sea Urchins provide a temporarily available prey subsidy for Harlequin Ducks. Our observations document a novel effect of Sea Otters providing important prey supplementation to a marine bird when foraging in urchin-rich habitats, contributing to the overall role of Sea Otters as a keystone species.

scholarly journals Utilitarian redundancy in local medical systems - theoretical and methodological contributions

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrícia Muniz de Medeiros ◽  
Washington Soares Ferreira Júnior ◽  
Fabiane da Silva Queiroz
Keyword(s):  
Therapeutic Indication ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Medical Systems ◽  
Social Ecological Systems ◽  
Number Of Species ◽  
Social Ecological ◽  
Methodological Improvement ◽  
Redundancy Index

Abstract The utilitarian redundancy model (URM) is one of the recent contributions to ethnobiology. We argue that URM can be applied to access use-pressure on plant species, the resilience of socioecological systems (e.g., local medical systems), cultural keystone species, and the role of exotic species in social-ecological systems. Based on previous URM studies, we also emphasize the need to differ practical (considering plants and uses that are currently employed) and theoretical (considering both currently employed and potentially employed plants and uses) redundancy. Based on the main applications of the URM, we propose a new index to access redundancy of a therapeutic indication: the Uredit, so that Uredit = NSp + CR, were Uredit is the Utilitarian Redundancy Index for the therapeutic indication; NSp is the total number of species mentioned for the indication, and CR is the species’ contribution to redundancy (in terms of knowledge sharing). The maximum value that the Uredit could reach is twice the number of species employed for the therapeutic indication. We believe that this theoretical and methodological improvement in the model can improve comparisons of redundancy in different social-ecological systems. We also highlight some limitations of the URM (and our Uredit), and we believe that conscious reasons behind people’s decisions should be incorporated into future studies on the subject.

scholarly journals Large extinctions in an evolutionary model: The role of innovation and keystone species

2002 ◽  
Vol 99 (4) ◽  
pp. 2055-2060 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Jain ◽  
S. Krishna
Keyword(s):  
Keystone Species ◽  
Evolutionary Model

scholarly journals High-magnitude innovators as keystone individuals in the evolution of culture

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michal Arbilly
Keyword(s):  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Food Webs ◽  
Computer Simulations ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Keystone Species ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Independent Innovation ◽  
High Magnitude ◽  
Behavioural Repertoire

AbstractBorrowing from the concept of keystone species in ecological food webs, a recent focus in the field of animal behaviour has been keystone individuals: individuals whose impact on population dynamics is disproportionally larger than their frequency in the population. In populations evolving culture, such may be the role of high-magnitude innovators: individuals whose innovations are a major departure from the population’s existing behavioural repertoire. Their effect on cultural evolution is twofold: they produce innovations that constitute a ‘cultural leap’, and, once copied, their innovations may induce further innovations by conspecifics (socially induced innovations), as they explore the new behaviour themselves. I use computer simulations to study the co-evolution of independent innovations, socially induced innovations, and innovation magnitude, and show that while socially induced innovation is assumed here to be less costly than independent innovation, it does not readily evolve. When it evolves, it may in some conditions select against independent innovation and lower its frequency, despite it requiring independent innovation in order to operate; at the same time, however, it leads to much faster cultural evolution. These results confirm the role of high-magnitude innovators as keystones, and suggest a novel explanation for low frequency of independent innovation.

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