Dataset Information

Climate-change refugia: biodiversity in the slow lane.

ABSTRACT: Climate-change adaptation focuses on conducting and translating research to minimize the dire impacts of anthropogenic climate change, including threats to biodiversity and human welfare. One adaptation strategy is to focus conservation on climate-change refugia (that is, areas relatively buffered from contemporary climate change over time that enable persistence of valued physical, ecological, and sociocultural resources). In this Special Issue, recent methodological and conceptual advances in refugia science will be highlighted. Advances in this emerging subdiscipline are improving scientific understanding and conservation in the face of climate change by considering scale and ecosystem dynamics, and looking beyond climate exposure to sensitivity and adaptive capacity. We propose considering refugia in the context of a multifaceted, long-term, network-based approach, as temporal and spatial gradients of ecological persistence that can act as "slow lanes" rather than areas of stasis. After years of discussion confined primarily to the scientific literature, researchers and resource managers are now working together to put refugia conservation into practice.

SUBMITTER: Morelli TL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7787983 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Climate-change refugia: biodiversity in the slow lane.

Morelli Toni Lyn TL Barrows Cameron W CW Ramirez Aaron R AR Cartwright Jennifer M JM Ackerly David D DD Eaves Tatiana D TD Ebersole Joseph L JL Krawchuk Meg A MA Letcher Benjamin H BH Mahalovich Mary F MF Meigs Garrett W GW Michalak Julia L JL Millar Constance I CI Quiñones Rebecca M RM Stralberg Diana D Thorne James H JH

Frontiers in ecology and the environment 20200601 5

Climate-change adaptation focuses on conducting and translating research to minimize the dire impacts of anthropogenic climate change, including threats to biodiversity and human welfare. One adaptation strategy is to focus conservation on climate-change refugia (that is, areas relatively buffered from contemporary climate change over time that enable persistence of valued physical, ecological, and sociocultural resources). In this Special Issue, recent methodological and conceptual advances in ...[more]

PMID: 33424494

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Project description:IntroductionEstimated future climate scenarios can be used to predict where hotspots of endemism may occur over the next century, but life history, ecological and genetic traits will be important in informing the varying responses within myriad taxa. Essential to predicting the consequences of climate change to individual species will be an understanding of the factors that drive genetic structure within and among populations. Here, I review the factors that influence the genetic structure of plant species in California, but are applicable elsewhere; existing levels of genetic variation, life history and ecological characteristics will affect the ability of an individual taxon to persist in the presence of anthropogenic change.Factors influencing the distribution of genetic variationPersistence in the face of climate change is likely determined by life history characteristics: dispersal ability, generation time, reproductive ability, degree of habitat specialization, plant-insect interactions, existing genetic diversity and availability of habitat or migration corridors. Existing levels of genetic diversity in plant populations vary based on a number of evolutionary scenarios that include endemism, expansion since the last glacial maximum, breeding system and current range sizes.Regional priorities and examplesA number of well-documented examples are provided from the California Floristic Province. Some predictions can be made for the responses of plant taxa to rapid environmental changes based on geographic position, evolutionary history, existing genetic variation, and ecological amplitude.Conclusions, solutions and recommendationsThe prediction of how species will respond to climate change will require a synthesis drawing from population genetics, geography, palaeontology and ecology. The important integration of the historical factors that have shaped the distribution and existing genetic structure of California's plant taxa will enable us to predict and prioritize the conservation of species and areas most likely to be impacted by rapid climate change, human disturbance and invasive species.

Dataset Information

Climate-change refugia: biodiversity in the slow lane.

Publications

Climate-change refugia: biodiversity in the slow lane.

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