scholarly journals Spatial modeling of extinct Southeast Asian Hobbit Homo floresiensis habitat suitability based on its diet availability and climatic parameters as a proxy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andri A Wibowo

The discovery of a new prehistoric species of the genus Homo remains a significant matter of intense interest. One of significant discovery recently is the Homo floresiensis, representing a small-bodied and small-brained hominin, excavated, and found in Liang Bua Cave in Flores Island, East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. This species height was only about 106 cm (3'6") and the weight was 30-40 kg (66-86 lbs). H. floresiensis was known consumed extant murine rodents as its diets as this was evidence found in Liang Bua Cave. Then this study aims to model the H. floresiensis suitable habitat using maximum entropy method and 2 extant murine rodents, Rattus exulans and R. rattus as a proxy. The results show that the most suitable habitats for H. floresiensis indicated by suitable habitat values close to 1 were concentrated in the central of Flores Island that was overlapped with mountainous areas with elevation ranging from 1500 to 2000 m. These suitable habitats were also overlapped with dense vegetation covers, volcanic rock, and Kiro rock formation. Climatic parameters that limit the distributions of H. floresiensis were annual mean temperature, isothermality, minimum temperature of coldest period, and precipitation seasonality. Parts of Flores Island with the low temperature below 20 0C were favorable for H. floresiensis while an increase in isothermality limits the H. floresiensis distributions

Plants ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 84
Author(s):  
Huanchu Liu ◽  
Hans Jacquemyn ◽  
Xingyuan He ◽  
Wei Chen ◽  
Yanqing Huang ◽  
...  

Human pressure on the environment and climate change are two important factors contributing to species decline and overall loss of biodiversity. Orchids may be particularly vulnerable to human-induced losses of habitat and the pervasive impact of global climate change. In this study, we simulated the extent of the suitable habitat of three species of the terrestrial orchid genus Cypripedium in northeast China and assessed the impact of human pressure and climate change on the future distribution of these species. Cypripedium represents a genus of long-lived terrestrial orchids that contains several species with great ornamental value. Severe habitat destruction and overcollection have led to major population declines in recent decades. Our results showed that at present the most suitable habitats of the three species can be found in Da Xing’an Ling, Xiao Xing’an Ling and in the Changbai Mountains. Human activity was predicted to have the largest impact on species distributions in the Changbai Mountains. In addition, climate change was predicted to lead to a shift in distribution towards higher elevations and to an increased fragmentation of suitable habitats of the three investigated Cypripedium species in the study area. These results will be valuable for decision makers to identify areas that are likely to maintain viable Cypripedium populations in the future and to develop conservation strategies to protect the remaining populations of these enigmatic orchid species.


Plants ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 1604
Author(s):  
Sun Hee Hong ◽  
Yong Ho Lee ◽  
Gaeun Lee ◽  
Do-Hun Lee ◽  
Pradeep Adhikari

Predicting the distribution of invasive weeds under climate change is important for the early identification of areas that are susceptible to invasion and for the adoption of the best preventive measures. Here, we predicted the habitat suitability of 16 invasive weeds in response to climate change and land cover changes in South Korea using a maximum entropy modeling approach. Based on the predictions of the model, climate change is likely to increase habitat suitability. Currently, the area of moderately suitable and highly suitable habitats is estimated to be 8877.46 km2, and 990.29 km2, respectively, and these areas are expected to increase up to 496.52% by 2050 and 1439.65% by 2070 under the representative concentration pathways 4.5 scenario across the country. Although habitat suitability was estimated to be highest in the southern regions (<36° latitude), the central and northern regions are also predicted to have substantial increases in suitable habitat areas. Our study revealed that climate change would exacerbate the threat of northward weed invasions by shifting the climatic barriers of invasive weeds from the southern region. Thus, it is essential to initiate control and management strategies in the southern region to prevent further invasions into new areas.


Oryx ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Desiree Andersen ◽  
Yoonjung Yi ◽  
Amaël Borzée ◽  
Kyungmin Kim ◽  
Kwang-Seon Moon ◽  
...  

Abstract Reintroductions of large carnivore species present unique opportunities to model population dynamics as populations can be monitored from the beginning of a reintroduction. However, analysis of the population dynamics of such reintroduced populations is rare and may be limited in incorporating the complex movements and environmental interactions of large carnivores. Starting in 2004, Asiatic black bears Ursus thibetanus were reintroduced and tracked in the Republic of Korea, along with their descendants, using radio telemetry, yielding 33,924 tracking points over 12 years. Along with information about habitat use, landscape, and resource availability, we estimated the population equilibrium and dispersal capability of the reintroduced population. We used a mixed modelling approach to determine suitable habitat areas, population equilibria for three different resources-based scenarios, and least-cost pathways (i.e. corridors) for dispersal. Our population simulations provided a mean population equilibrium of 64 individuals at the original reintroduction site and a potential maximum of 1,438 individuals in the country. The simulation showed that the bear population will disperse to nearby mountainous areas, but a second reintroduction will be required to fully restore U. thibetanus. Northern suitable habitats are currently disconnected and natural re-population is unlikely to happen unless supported. Our methodologies and findings are also relevant for determining the outcome and trajectories of reintroduced populations of other large carnivores.


1996 ◽  
Vol 51 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 337-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariusz Maćkowiak ◽  
Piotr Kątowski

Abstract Two-dimensional zero-field nutation NQR spectroscopy has been used to determine the full quadrupolar tensor of spin - 3/2 nuclei in serveral molecular crystals containing the 3 5 Cl and 7 5 As nuclei. The problems of reconstructing 2D-nutation NQR spectra using conventional methods and the advantages of using implementation of the maximum entropy method (MEM) are analyzed. It is shown that the replacement of conventional Fourier transform by an alternative data processing by MEM in 2D NQR spectroscopy leads to sensitivity improvement, reduction of instrumental artefacts and truncation errors, shortened data acquisition times and suppression of noise, while at the same time increasing the resolution. The effects of off-resonance irradiation in nutation experiments are demonstrated both experimentally and theoretically. It is shown that off-resonance nutation spectroscopy is a useful extension of the conventional on-resonance experiments, thus facilitating the determination of asymmetry parameters in multiple spectrum. The theoretical description of the off-resonance effects in 2D nutation NQR spectroscopy is given, and general exact formulas for the asymmetry parameter are obtained. In off-resonance conditions, the resolution of the nutation NQR spectrum decreases with the spectrometer offset. However, an enhanced resolution can be achieved by using the maximum entropy method in 2D-data reconstruction.


Geophysics ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 1417-1422 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danilo R. Velis

The distribution of primary reflection coefficients can be estimated by means of the maximum entropy method, giving rise to smooth nonparametric functions which are consistent with the data. Instead of using classical moments (e.g. skewness and kurtosis) to constraint the maximization, nonconventional sample statistics help to improve the quality of the estimates. Results using real log data from various wells located in the Neuquen Basin (Argentina) show the effectiveness of the method to estimate both robust and consistent distributions that may be used to simulate realistic sequences.


1996 ◽  
Vol 03 (03) ◽  
pp. 1393-1402 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. FISCHER ◽  
TH. FAUSTER ◽  
W. VON DER LINDEN ◽  
V. DOSE

Island-size distributions of submonolayer Ag films on Pd(111) adsorbed at 90 K and after annealing of the film are recovered from two-photon photoemission spectra of the first image state. The inversion of the ill-conditioned problem with the maximum-entropy method reveals magic numbers in the island-size distributions. Hypothesis testing within the framework of Bayesian probability theory indicates a critical nucleus size i=1. After annealing of the film large islands coexist with small clusters in a two-phase state.


1987 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 78-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. C. De Simone ◽  
F. De Luca ◽  
B. Maraviglia

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