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ecology

Latest Articles

Abstractions blog

Why Nature Prefers Couples, Even for Yeast

By Jordana Cepelewicz
July 17, 2018
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Some species have the equivalent of many more than two sexes, but most do not. A new model suggests the reason depends on how often they mate.

ecology

Cores From Coral Reefs Hold Secrets of the Seas’ Past and Future

By Elizabeth Svoboda
May 29, 2018
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Layered deposits of coral skeletons hold vast stores of environmental data from thousands of years ago, including annual records of ocean temperatures, water pollution and storm activity.

Art for "A Thermodynamic Answer to Why Birds Migrate"
ecology

A Thermodynamic Answer to Why Birds Migrate

By Jordana Cepelewicz
May 7, 2018
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New modeling studies suggest that birds migrate to strike a favorable balance between their input and output of energy.

Abstractions blog

Complex Animals Led to More Oxygen, Says Maverick Theory

By Jordana Cepelewicz
March 21, 2018
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For decades, researchers have commonly assumed that higher oxygen levels led to the sudden diversification of animal life 540 million years ago. But one iconoclast argues the opposite: that new animal behaviors raised oxygen levels and remade the environment.

520px photo of phytoplankton
Abstractions blog

Evolution Saves Species From ‘Kill the Winner’ Disasters

By John Rennie
February 12, 2018
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Modelers find evidence that a combination of competition, predation and evolution will push ecosystems toward species diversity anywhere in the universe.

Tidal pool with ocean life
Abstractions blog

Awash in Sea of Data, Ecologists Turn to Open Access Tools

By John Rennie
May 24, 2017
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To assess the ocean’s health, ecology’s “rugged individualists” learned to get with the big data program.

ecology

A Timely Fix for a Grand Theory of Nature

By Veronique Greenwood
March 11, 2016
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A disarmingly simple model of ecology does everything well — except predict how rapidly nature can change. Can it become more realistic while still avoiding all of biology’s messy complexities?

complex systems

Nature’s Critical Warning System

By Natalie Wolchover
November 18, 2015
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Scientists are homing in on a warning signal that arises in complex systems like ecological food webs, the brain and the Earth’s climate. Could it help prevent future catastrophes?

ecology

A Twisted Path to Equation-Free Prediction

By Gabriel Popkin
October 13, 2015
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Complex natural systems defy analysis using a standard mathematical toolkit, so one ecologist is throwing out the equations.


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