ABSTRACT Autotomy, or voluntary limb loss, is a widespread defence strategy among arthropods, yet its ecological costs and benefits in spiders remain poorly documented. Here, we report natural history observations of leg autotomy in 32 species across eight families from four coastal wetlands in Kerala, India. Patterns of autotomy varied widely among species. Many spiders, including members of the orb-weaving family Araneidae, shed legs at the coxa–trochanter joint, a mechanism that minimises haemolymph loss. Agile hunters such as members of the families Salticidae and Oxyopidae frequently autotomised multiple legs, with potentially severe consequences for locomotion. Notably, repeated cases in the jumping spider Carrhotus viduus (CL Koch) highlight the trade-offs faced by active hunters that depend heavily on agility. These findings highlight the taxonomic breadth, ecological variation and functional consequences of autotomy in spiders, underscoring its adaptive value while drawing attention to its hidden costs. We suggest that autotomy merits systematic study as an ecologically significant yet overlooked survival strategy in arachnids. This study presents the first broad field-based documentation of autotomy in spiders from Kerala, India, thereby extending current knowledge of its ecological relevance in tropical habitats.

Biodiversity is declining in many parts of the world. Biological diversity measurement and monitoring are fundamental to the assessment of the causes and consequences of environmental changes, identification of key areas for the protection of biodiversity or ecosystem services, determining the effectiveness of actions, and the creation of decision-support tools critical to maintaining a sustainable planet. Biodiversity measurement is rapidly changing due to advances in citizen science, image recognition, acoustic monitoring, environmental DNA, genomics, remote sensing, and AI. In this perspective, we outline the exciting opportunities these developments offer but also consider the challenges. Our key recommendations are to 1) Capitalize on the ability of novel technology to integrate data sources 2) agree to standard methods for data collection 3) ensure new technologies are calibrated with existing data; 4) fill data gaps by using emerging technologies and increasing capacity, especially in the tropics; 5) create living safeguarded databases of trusted information to reduce the risk of poisoning by AI hallucinated, or false, information; 6) ensure data generation is valued; 7) ensure respectful incorporation of Indigenous Knowledge; 8) ensure measurements enable the quantification of effectiveness of actions, and 9) increase the resilience of global datasets to technical and societal change. Radical new collaborations are needed between computer scientists, engineers, molecular biologists, data scientists, field ecologists, citizen scientists, Indigenous peoples, policymakers, and local communities to create the rigorous, resilient, accessible biodiversity information systems required to underpin policies and practices that ensure the maintenance and restoration of ecological systems.

Rare laryngeal tumors: A retrospective bicentric study on 74 patients and systematic review.

Lost in space, lost in time: A clinician's proposed approach to the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis.

Microbial strategies for soda saline-alkali soil remediation: The role of haloalkaliphilic bacteria.

Sea turtle hatching success is influenced by a complex combination of environmental, biological, and anthropogenic factors, making it essential to understand its dynamics for effective conservation planning. This study utilizes Ball Mapper, a topological data analysis (TDA) tool, alongside the Isolation Forest anomaly detection algorithm to investigate 10 years (2013–2023) of high-dimensional ecological data from a coastal sea turtle nesting site. The dataset includes monthly records of hatch rates, predator activity, fungal presence, and flooding events. The Ball Mapper topological graphs revealed consistent seasonal trends, with April, May, and June exhibiting the highest hatching success across years. Meanwhile, months like January and February showed consistently lower outcomes and shared structural similarities in the data topology. Isolation Forest identified months with extreme ecological stressors as anomalies; however, months such as May and June 2016 still achieved high hatching success, suggesting that the presence of some predators may have also played a role in natural biocontrol. The TDA and anomaly-based approaches provided a better understanding of the complex relationships driving hatching success, uncovering patterns not easily detected by conventional methods. By visualizing temporal and ecological variation in hatching outcomes, the research supports data-driven strategies to enhance sea turtle conservation in the face of increasing environmental variability and ecological pressure.

Many traits influence fitness indirectly by modifying shared environments that are transmitted across generations, a process known as ecological inheritance. Here, we investigate how variation in traits to improve common resources emerges when locally modified environments show ecological inheritance. Using eco-evolutionary modeling, we reveal that ecological inheritance, when combined with limited dispersal, can facilitate the coexistence of two types with opposite ecological legacies: environmental helpers, who improve the local environment for the future at a personal cost, and environmental free riders, who benefit without contributing to the detriment of future generations, particularly when interactions among helpers generate diminishing returns. This polymorphism generates lasting spatial heterogeneity in environmental quality and, consequently, in survival and reproduction-particularly under isolation-by-distance, where it creates stable clusters of high- and low-quality habitats across an otherwise homogeneous landscape. These findings reveal how ecological inheritance and spatial structure interact to stabilize polymorphism, potentially driving long-term behavioral, ecological, and fitness variation across diverse biological systems.

Variability in the feeding ecology and behaviour of extant European reindeer subspecies inferred from dental microwear texture analysis

Floodplain wetlands in riverine environments are characterized by rhythmic hydrological changes, which re-structure physical habitat, change between aquatic and dry life conditions, reset successions, and facilitate the respective food chains and/or migration/drift of nutrients and organisms. Since the earliest days of humankind, these floodplains were sought-after places for humans to settle, use natural resources directly or indirectly, to learn from nature. and even to venerate nature in spiritual relationships. The fast industrial and commercial developments of the past centuries have caused a decrease in the valuation of wetlands by humans, going along with the cutting-off of the natural hydrological regime by dikes and dams and their large-scale transformation into permanent dry land. This paper delivers a review on (i) Driving forces that form biocultural diversity in river floodplains, (ii) Typology of cultural activities in river floodplains, (iii) Today’s co-decline/extinction of biocultural diversity in river floodplains, and (iv) Cultural practices as inspiration for future conservation and sustainable development in Europe. Rather than presenting cultural practices in the form of a “Red list”, we want to highlight that they are actually a tool to rediscover, evolve, or create new cultural linkages with rivers and their floodplains and to help to take action to better respect, protect, restore, or to newly create these floodplains. Cultural practices can be studied in a similar way to more-than-human species traits, including their cultural activities. Biological and cultural diversity in floodplains is threatened by similar drivers. Cultural diversity can deliver important incentives for floodplain management.

The fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity adopted four Global Goals for 2050 and 23 Targets for 2030. One concern has been the lack of a monitoring mechanism to measure the progress of countries in protecting biodiversity as a step towards the 2050 Goal of 'halting extinction'. Clearly defined conservation targets are essential. There is abundant quantitative evidence of human impacts. We ask three questions. (i) Does conservation slow global extinction rates? (ii) Does conservation rescue previously declining populations? (iii) What is the progress of protecting areas globally? Are such areas selected optimally to slow extinctions and reverse population declines? We find a disconnect between unsupported claims about impending planetary doom and carefully documented evidence of conservation's successes and failures. Certainly, gaps exist in our knowledge about biodiversity loss. Nonetheless, conservation has prevented extinctions and allowed some once-declining species to flourish. It protects ever-greater areas of land and ocean, often doing so in sensible places. Future success will depend on clearly defined metrics to measure what works and what does not. Such a recommendation resonates strongly with the work that Professor Dame Georgina Mace pioneered.

This article examines the scope and operation of the Conference of the Parties’ (COP) decision-making powers under Article 22 of the Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ Agreement), which will enter into force on 17 January 2026. It interrogates the persistent ambiguity surrounding the Agreement’s relationship with other relevant legal instruments, frameworks, and bodies (IFBs), especially in the context of area-based management tools (ABMTs), including marine protected areas (MPAs). This article contends that prevailing interpretations of the “not to undermine” proviso in Articles 5(2) and 22(2) are overly restrictive, reflecting the political sensitivities of the negotiation phase rather than the treaty’s object and purpose. It argues that in the implementation phase, “undermining” must be reinterpreted through the lens of the Agreement’s objectives of conservation and sustainable use. Against this backdrop, this article advances a textual and teleological reading of Article 22 that supports a more proactive COP, capable of adopting measures that complement and reinforce, rather than merely defer to, existing IFBs. Special attention is given to the concept of “compatible” conservation measures in Article 22(1)(b) as a mechanism for ensuring a balanced and mutually reinforcing relationship of BBNJ institutions.

A global standard for the identification of Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs) was published 10 years ago to provide a unified set of criteria for identifying 'sites of significance for the global persistence of biodiversity'. We review the initiative's origins, the KBA identification process, characteristics of the current network, threats, policy uptake, private sector applications and future priorities. KBAs are identified using criteria with quantitative thresholds relating to threatened or geographically restricted species or ecosystems, ecological integrity, biological processes, or irreplaceability. These criteria can be applied in terrestrial, inland water, marine and subterranean environments, and to all taxonomic groups. A total of 16,596 KBAs covering 22.1 million km2 has been identified, with 29% of these sites in marine and 26% in freshwater ecosystems. KBAs range from 0.001 km2 to 712,457 km2 in extent, with a median size of 141 km2 and a mean of 1,364 km2. Most (63%) qualify due to the globally threatened species they support, with 48% being important for biological processes and 39% for geographically restricted species. KBAs have been identified for 18,365 qualifying species in total, of which 37% are plants and 32% are birds. The most prevalent threats are biological resource use (hunting, logging, fishing, etc., impacting 40.8% of sites with available data), unsustainable agriculture (40.7%), human intrusions and disturbance (38.4%) and natural systems modifications (water management and fire; 33.4%). KBAs are important for delivering ecosystem services to people, both locally and globally. KBAs have had widespread impact in informing protected area designation in all regions. In total, 10,054 sites (62%) are covered completely or partially by protected areas. Hence, KBAs are highly relevant to Target 3 (and other targets) in the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, and to Sustainable Development Goals 14.5, 15.1, and 15.4. Indicators based on KBA data are therefore being used by the Convention on Biological Diversity and United Nations to track progress towards these targets. Many companies and financial institutions use KBAs to assess their exposure to nature-related risks and to identify opportunities for site-level, nature-positive actions. Future priorities include expanding and updating KBA assessments, and strengthening efforts to protect, conserve and safeguard these sites effectively.

Agricultural cyberbiosecurity (CBS) scholarship may have overwhelmingly adopted centralized, national-securityorientedframeworks that leave community-governed and agroecologically-grounded alternatives unexplored. Recent AIsafety research demonstrates that provably safe Artificial General Intelligence is mathematically incompatible with trustand alignment, casting doubt on the viability of general-purpose, centralized safety regimes versus bounded ordecentralized ones (Panigrahy and Sharan, 2025). Some leading expressions of the centralized CBS paradigm proposebillions in surveillance architecture spanning unified biological intelligence (BIOINT), national bioaudit systems, andcoordinated governance bodies. Centralized approaches often compellingly diagnose monoculture vulnerabilities,biosurveillance urgency, and the need for novel governance mechanisms. However, in these centralized architectures,communities receive biosecurity services but do not co-govern biosurveillance priorities, data use, or safety specifications,and agriculture remains a critical infrastructure to be defended from above. Even when such centralized paradigmspropose distributed biological sensing, such as engineered sentinel plants and living biosensors, these systems requireroutine community-level care, maintenance, and trust relationships that centralized architectures cannot deliver, and willdemand iterative updating as threat landscapes evolve. The empirical record confirms the costs of centralization: $11million in ransom paid by JBS, 40% of U.S. grain production disrupted by a single cooperative's software failure (Yazdinejadet al., 2021; Cartwright and Cartwright, 2023). Coordination gaps are real, and new institutions are necessary to addressthem. However, coordination without corresponding community-level governance authority reproduces the monoculturepattern at the institutional level. This paper argues that agricultural defense must be rooted in the slowest and mostdurable layers of change identified by Stewart Brand's pace-layer framework: nature and culture. We advance threeinterlocking components: (1) agroecology as defensive architecture, in which biological diversity and functional redundancyconstitute the primary cyberbiosecurity strategy; (2) sovereignty-preserving biosurveillance, in which community-governedfederated sensing networks retain local data authority while enabling collective threat detection through privacypreservingmechanisms; and (3) cooperative assurance from below, in which safety specifications are collectivelydeliberated and verified through participatory guarantee systems rather than centralized certification hierarchies(Dalrymple et al., 2024; Carroll et al., 2023; Manoj et al., 2025). This framework does not preclude centralized pathogendetection where necessary, but insists that top-level and community-level institutions must be in relation so thatcoordination flows bidirectionally rather than exclusively from above. Rather than claiming comprehensive safetyguarantees, we demonstrate how bounded formal assurances, when integrated with agroecological resilience andcommunity governance, can materially improve the security of food systems under real-world constraints.

The new synanthropic crevice weaver spider species, from the family Filistatidae, Pikelinia floydmuraria sp. nov . (male and females) is described from the department of Tolima, Colombia. The female internal genitalia of P. fasciata from the Galapagos islands, Ecuador, is described here for the first time. Additional unidentified species of Pikelinia populations were recorded in the departments of Cauca, Quindío, and Risaralda. Dietary analysis of P. floydmuraria sp. nov . (Tolima) and Pikelinia sp. (Armenia) revealed a predominance of Hymenoptera (~35% of prey), followed by Diptera and Coleoptera. This study expands known diversity and trophic ecology of Pikelinia genus.

Representation of the world’s Indigenous Peoples’ cultural, political, environmental, and social issues continues to be marginalized within and across the seven sociocultural regions designated by the UNPFII (Africa, the Arctic, Asia, Central and South America and the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, the Russian Federation, Central Asia and Transcaucasia, North America, and the Pacific). This marginalization is characteristic of the global Indigenous political identity recognized by international law and treaties. This perspective study proposes and advocates for the right of people to have their own media, a stance informed by and grounded in field research by Indigenous policy negotiation teams at the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and the UN Media Caucus Board since 2018. This study makes a case for the urgent need for Indigenous media ownership as essential to discussions of how global policy development could support this media. This includes, for example, curating specialized content provided directly by Indigenous Peoples’ newsrooms, as well as the development of special programming that links into the United Nations streaming system in parallel to negotiations through mainstream global media platforms. At present, decisive negotiations between nation-states, stakeholders, and Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities are taking place across complementary treaties, which address the case of enhancing the visibility of Indigenous Peoples through their own global media networks, a historical shift in the terms of representation between Indigenous Peoples and the rest of the world.

Abstract Few fern taxa are as iconic as Polypodium vulgare, the type species of Polypodium, the namesake genus of the largest fern family, Polypodiaceae. Originally described by Linnaeus, P. vulgare was once considered a single circumboreal species exhibiting subtle morphological and ecological variation. Generations of researchers have revealed that P. vulgare is an allotetraploid belonging to a reticulation complex of mainly northern temperate species, but the P. vulgare complex continues to yield novel taxonomic diversity. Here we apply broad sampling of P. vulgare in Europe and Asia, maternally inherited plastome sequences, bi-parentally inherited nuclear target capture datasets, and the updated SORTER2-Toolkit bioinformatics pipeline to demonstrate that P. vulgare is restricted to Europe, whereas specimens from Asia represent a second allopolyploid species of distinct parentage. While both are of Pleistocene origin, our divergence dating estimates suggest that the Asian taxon, putatively named Polypodium ‘okiense’, probably formed prior to P. vulgare in Europe and support the hypothesis that European P. vulgare is a progenitor of the allohexaploid Polypodium interjectum. In addition, we infer the taxonomic identity of an enigmatic population from South Africa, and address implications for floristics and pharmaceutical applications of these conflated taxa.

Progression from monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) to multiple myeloma (MM) is driven by coordinated metabolic reprogramming within clonal plasma cells and the bone marrow microenvironment. We applied high-resolution MALDI-FT-ICR mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) to archived FFPE bone-marrow biopsies, integrated with matched bone marrow plasma metabolomics, to map spatial and systemic metabolic alterations. Spatial clustering delineated plasma-cell-rich niches, while Hill-based diversity and β-diversity metrics quantified intra- and inter-compartment heterogeneity. MM niches exhibited elevated 3-hydroxykynurenine, rewired tryptophan-kynurenine flux, and increased nucleotide and bioactive lipid metabolism associated with proliferation. Notably, some MGUS-like samples displayed MM-like metabolic niches undetectable in bone marrow plasma alone, underscoring spatial heterogeneity. Cross-compartment integration revealed conserved metabolic signatures and systemic redistribution of key metabolites, consistent with ecological reorganization and niche divergence during progression. These findings establish spatial metabolomics of biopsies as a framework to dissect intramedullary metabolic heterogeneity and enable metabolite-based risk stratification in plasma-cell disorders.

The study examines the floral assemblages preserved in sedimentary deposits and amber from the Umarsar Lignite Mine (Harudi Formation, Kutch) to evaluate their biogeographical affinities within the context of India’s northward drift during the Eocene. The taxonomic composition and ecological structure of the assemblage indicate the persistence of extensive wet evergreen tropical rainforests dominated by palms and dipterocarps under warm, humid and equable greenhouse climatic conditions. Transregional correlation with contemporaneous palynoassemblages from the Cambay and Kutch basins, as well as lignite-bearing successions of Rajasthan, demonstrates broad floristic coherence across western India during the Eocene, while highlighting basin-scale ecological variability linked to palaeolatitude, hydrology and depositional setting. Biogeographical affinity analysis shows a strong representation of Gondwanan lineages, including African and Amazonian elements, with limited Laurasian influence, supporting pronounced biotic continuity with southern hemisphere floras. The early occurrence of several Gondwanan-affiliated taxa further suggests intermittent biotic exchange between the Indian subcontinent and Eurasia via the Kohistan–Ladakh Island Arc during the Early to Middle Eocene, challenging models of prolonged Indian isolation. High-resolution taxonomic documentation using Confocal Laser Scanning Microscopy (CLSM) enhances morphological resolution of key palynomorphs and strengthens palaeoecological and biogeographical interpretations. Collectively, these results highlight the role of the Indian subcontinent as a dynamic biogeographical bridge that contributed significantly to the early assembly of palaeotropical rainforest biotas during the Eocene greenhouse interval.

Purpose: In this study, it was aimed to evaluate the study and research outputs intented at the protection and development of agricultural biological diversity carried out at the Eskişehir Transitional Zone Agricultural Research Institute from its establishment (1925) until today. Method: In the preparation of this article, annual research reports and literature information regularly published by the Institute every year were taken as basis. Findings: Eskişehir Transitional Zone Agricultural Research Institute; Its works for the protection and development of agricultural biological diversity started on December 13, 1925 and it still continues its activities in a total area of 646 hectares in 3 separate campuses, including the Central Campus in Eskişehir Karagözler neighboorhood Karabayır Bağları location. The study area of the institute is a basin (region) research institute and covers a total of 12 provinces, including Eskişehir, Kütahya, Afyonkarahisar, Uşak, Burdur, Isparta, Denizli, Bilecik, Bursa, Kocaeli, Sakarya and Yalova. As a result of the studies carried out at the institute, 181 plant varieties and Türkiye's first broiler chicken breed, "Anadolu T", were registered. Seeds of high-yielding varieties developed through breeding studies were produced and delivered to seed producers. In addition, the Institute has completed many projects on the collection, preservation and use of genetic resources as genetic resources in breeding studies. Since our institute was founded, cool climate grains, edible legumes, oilseed plants, medicinal and aromatic plants, meadow-pasture and forage plants, biodiversity and genetic resources, vegetable growing, soil and water resources, Türkiye’s brood broiler chicken breeding project II. It continues its activities in the fields of meat brood breeding, education and extension activities.Conclusion: As a result, Eskişehir Transitional Zone Agricultural Research Institute continues its efforts to ensure the sustainable use of agricultural biodiversity and food security, and to produce solutions to nutritional problems in the country and around the world, with its studies.

Ecological niche divergence and specialization in Dianthus pseudocrinitus, a neo-endemic species: ecological evidence challenges sister-taxon delimitation