Species extinction problem: genetic vs ecological factors

Extinction events and species lifetimes in a simple ecological model

A model for large-scale evolution recently introduced by Amaral and Meyer is studied analytically and numerically. Species are located at different trophic levels and become extinct if their prey becomes extinct. It is proved that this model is self-organized critical in the thermodynamic limit, with an exponent 2 characterizing the size distribution of extinction events. The lifetime distribut...

Ecological Consequences of Extinction Ecological Consequences of Extinction

Effects of regional vs. ecological factors on plant species richness: an intercontinental analysis.

Conclusions from past studies on the roles that historical and regional factors and contemporary and ecological factors have played in regulating large-scale patterns of species richness have been controversial. Conflicting past results were likely affected by differences in the range of environments analyzed and the scales of observation. Eastern North America and eastern Asia are ideal region...

Most species are not driven to extinction before genetic factors impact them.

There is controversy concerning the role of genetic factors in species extinctions. Many authors have asserted that species are usually driven to extinction before genetic factors have time to impact them, but few studies have seriously addressed this issue. If this assertion is true, there will be little difference in genetic diversity between threatened and taxonomically related nonthreatened...

Commentary Ecological mechanisms of extinction

E theory offers predictions, sometimes conflicting, about the ecological characteristics of species that correlate with their risk of extinction. It is generally agreed that risk should be higher for species with small populations, small geographic ranges, and poor dispersal ability than for their ecological counterparts (1–3). How suites of life history characteristics affect risk of extinctio...