Internal organs of ectotherms have melanin-containing cells that confer different degrees of coloration to them. Previous experimental studies analyzed their developmental origin, role in immunity, and hormonal regulation. For example, melanin increases with ultraviolet radiation (UV) and temperature in frogs and fish. However, little is known about how environmental variables influence the amo...

Understanding climatic influences on the proportion of evergreen versus deciduous broad-leaved tree species in forests is of crucial importance when predicting the impact of climate change on broad-leaved forests. Here, we quantified the geographical distribution of evergreen versus deciduous broad-leaved tree species in subtropical China. The Relative Importance Value index (RIV) was used to e...

We present the first extensive and integrative analysis of niche evolution based on climatic variables and a dated molecular phylogeny of a heterogeneous avian group of Southeast Asian scimitar babblers of the genus Pomatorhinus. The four main clades of scimitar babblers have species that co-occur in similar areas across southern Asia but some have diverged at different timeframes, with the mos...

Many studies have reported statistically significant associations between bird migratory phenology and climatic variables, and, consequently, it is mostly accepted that recent shifts in migration dates are a reaction to present climate change. Impacts of weather and climate on departure date, progression and stopover frequency and duration have been reviewed in order to explain the current know...

Mountains are well-suited systems to disentangle the factors driving distribution of parasites due to their heterogeneity of climatic and habitat conditions. However, the information about the relative importance of environmental factors governing the distribution of avian haemosporidians on temperate mountains is very limited. The main goal of the present study is to identify the factors deter...

The rate of climatic-niche evolution is important to many research areas in ecology, evolution, and conservation biology, including responses of species to global climate change, spread of invasive species, speciation, biogeography, and patterns of species richness. Previous studies have implied that clades with higher rates of climatic-niche evolution among species should have species with nar...

Aim The network structure of food webs plays an important role in the maintenance of diversity and ecosystem functioning in ecological communities. Previous research has found that ecosystem size, resource availability, assembly history and biotic interactions can potentially drive food web structure. However, the relative influence of climatic variables that drive broad-scale biogeographic pat...

Currently there is a lack of quantitative information regarding the driving factors of vegetation dynamics in post-Soviet Central Asia. Insufficient knowledge also exists concerning vegetation variability across sub-humid to arid climatic gradients as well as vegetation response to different land uses, from natural rangelands to intensively irrigated croplands. In this study, we analyzed the en...