scholarly journals Eutrophication, biodiversity loss, and species invasions modify the relationship between host and parasite richness during host community assembly

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (9) ◽  
pp. 4854-4867 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fletcher W. Halliday ◽  
Robert W. Heckman ◽  
Peter A. Wilfahrt ◽  
Charles E. Mitchell
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fletcher W. Halliday ◽  
Robert W. Heckman ◽  
Peter A. Wilfahrt ◽  
Charles E. Mitchell

AbstractHost and parasite richness are generally positively correlated, but the stability of this relationship during community assembly remains untested. The composition of host communities can alter parasite transmission, and the relationship between host and parasite richness is sensitive to parasite transmission. Thus, changes in composition during host community assembly could strengthen or weaken the relationship between host and parasite richness. Host community assembly, in turn, can be driven by many processes, including resource enrichment. To test the hypothesis that host community assembly can alter the relationship between host and parasite richness, we experimentally crossed host diversity and resource supply to hosts, then allowed communities to assemble. As previously shown, initial host diversity and resource supply determined the trajectory of host community assembly, altering post-assembly host species richness, richness-independent host phylogenetic diversity, and colonization by exotic host species. Throughout community assembly, host richness predicted parasite richness. As predicted, this effect was moderated by exotic abundance: communities dominated by exotic species exhibited a stronger positive relationship between post-assembly host and parasite richness. Ultimately, these results suggest that, by modulating parasite transmission, community assembly can modify the relationship between host and parasite richness, providing a novel mechanism to explain contingencies in this relationship.


2012 ◽  
Vol 367 (1604) ◽  
pp. 2814-2827 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin D. Lafferty

Past models have suggested host–parasite coextinction could lead to linear, or concave down relationships between free-living species richness and parasite richness. I explored several models for the relationship between parasite richness and biodiversity loss. Life cycle complexity, low generality of parasites and sensitivity of hosts reduced the robustness of parasite species to the loss of free-living species diversity. Food-web complexity and the ordering of extinctions altered these relationships in unpredictable ways. Each disassembly of a food web resulted in a unique relationship between parasite richness and the richness of free-living species, because the extinction trajectory of parasites was sensitive to the order of extinctions of free-living species. However, the average of many disassemblies tended to approximate an analytical model. Parasites of specialist hosts and hosts higher on food chains were more likely to go extinct in food-web models. Furthermore, correlated extinctions between hosts and parasites (e.g. if parasites share a host with a specialist predator) led to steeper declines in parasite richness with biodiversity loss. In empirical food webs with random removals of free-living species, the relationship between free-living species richness and parasite richness was, on average, quasi-linear, suggesting biodiversity loss reduces parasite diversity more than previously thought.


Author(s):  
M.I. Rosas-Jaco ◽  
S.X. Almeraya-Quintero ◽  
L.G. Guajardo-Hernández

Objective: Tourism has become the main engine of economic, social and environmental development in several countries, so promoting tourism awareness among tourists and the local population should be a priority. The present study aims to suggest a status of the research carried out on the topic of tourism awareness. Design / methodology / approach: The type of analysis is through a retrospective and exploratory bibliometric study. The analysis materials were scientific articles and a training manual published between 2000 and 2020, registered by Scopus, Emerald insight and Dialnet, using “tourism awareness” as the keyword. Results: When considering the three senses in which tourism awareness ought to operate, it is concluded that studies are more focused on the relationship and contact of the host community with the tourist. It is observed that four out of six articles in this sense consider that education, training, and government policies around tourism awareness should be developed in a better way in the destinations, in order to be an element that contributes to the development of communities and reduces poverty in developing countries. Study limitations / implications: It is considered a limitation not to include thesis dissertations. Findings / conclusions: It is necessary to make visible the importance of tourism awareness as a local development strategy for communities, in addition to including tourism awareness on the part of tourists.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luz Garcia-Longoria ◽  
Jaime Muriel ◽  
Sergio Magallanes ◽  
Zaira Hellen Villa-Galarce ◽  
Leonila Ricopa ◽  
...  

Abstract Characterizing the diversity and structure of host-parasite communities is crucial to understanding their eco-evolutionary dynamics. Malaria and related haemosporidian parasites are responsible for fitness loss and mortality in bird species worldwide. However, despite exhibiting the greatest ornithological biodiversity, avian haemosporidians from Neotropical regions are quite unexplored. Here, we analyse the genetic diversity of bird haemosporidian parasites (Plasmodium and Haemoproteus) in 1,336 individuals belonging to 206 bird species to explore for differences in diversity of parasite lineages and bird species across five well-differentiated Peruvian ecoregions. We detected 70 different haemosporidian lineages infecting 74 bird species. We showed that 25 out of the 70 haplotypes had not been previously recorded. Moreover, we also identified 81 new host – parasite interactions representing new host records for these haemosporidian parasites. Our outcomes revealed that the effective diversity (as well as the richness, abundance, and Shannon-Weaver index) for both birds and parasite lineages was higher in Amazon basin ecoregions. Furthermore, we also showed that ecoregions with greater diversity of bird species also had high parasite richness, hence suggesting that host community is crucial in explaining parasite richness. Generalist parasites were found in ecoregions with lower bird diversity, implying that the abundance and richness of hosts may shape the exploitation strategy followed by haemosporidian parasites. These outcomes reveal that Neotropical region is a major reservoir of unidentified haemosporidian lineages. Further studies analysing host distribution and specificity of these parasites in the tropics will provide important knowledge about phylogenetic relationships, phylogeography, and patterns of evolution and distribution of haemosporidian parasites.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 4277
Author(s):  
Matthias Winfried Kleespies ◽  
Paul Wilhelm Dierkes

The UN's sustainable development goals (SDGs), which aim to solve important economic, social, and environmental problems of humanity, are to be supported by education for sustainable development (ESD). Empirical studies on the success of the implementation of the SDGs in the field of education are still pending. For this reason, using the loss of global biodiversity as an example, this study examined the extent to which high school students, teacher trainees in biology, and biology bachelor students can identify the causes of the global biodiversity loss. A new questioning tool was developed and tested on 889 participants. In addition, the relationship between connection to nature and the personal assessment about biodiversity threats was examined. The factor analysis of the scale used showed that 11 out of 16 items were assigned to the intended factor. The comparison between high school students, teacher trainees in biology, and biology bachelor students showed no significant difference in overall assessment of the reasons for global biodiversity loss. When comparing the three risk levels in which the risk factors for biodiversity could be divided, across the three student groups, only minor differences were found. Therefore, a specific education of prospective teachers is necessary, as they have to pass on the competence as multipliers to their students. No significant difference could be found when examining the relationship between connection to nature and the overall scores of the assessment scale for the reasons of biodiversity loss. However, it was found that people who felt more connected to nature were more capable of assessing the main causes of risk for global biodiversity, while people who felt less connected to nature achieved better scores for the medium factors.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4.35) ◽  
pp. 791
Author(s):  
Nurul Jannah Jalil ◽  
Zainon Mat Sharif

Recently, biodiversity loss has become direr international. Human behavior is one of the causes that harm the biodiversity richness. Malaysia which is known as the megadiversity country also facing with the similar problem. Conservation of the biodiversity must be taken seriously and importantly by people to maintain the relationship between human and nature because we are affecting each other. Thus, this research was aiming to evaluate the relationship between human attitude, experience and knowledge toward the awareness of biodiversity conservation. The research was conducted using 4 variables from Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) which are behavior, perceived behavioral control, subjective norms and attitude. This study was carried out in Malaysia by conducting a survey of 30 students from a private university. The findings of this study indicate that the mentioned have given the positive effect to the awareness of biological diversity conservation. In addition, the relation of knowledge and attitude also show the great correlation between themselves. Therefore, knowledge, experience and attitude are the factors that could increase peoples' awareness towards the biodiversity conservation and knowledge is the greatest influence in creating peoples' awareness.


2009 ◽  
Vol 276 (1662) ◽  
pp. 1657-1663 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pieter T.J Johnson ◽  
Peder J Lund ◽  
Richard B Hartson ◽  
Timothy P Yoshino

Global biodiversity loss and disease emergence are two of the most challenging issues confronting science and society. Recently, observed linkages between species-loss and vector-borne infections suggest that biodiversity may help reduce pathogenic infections in humans and wildlife, but the mechanisms underlying this relationship and its applicability to a broader range of pathogens have remained speculative. Here, we experimentally evaluated the effects of host community structure on transmission of the human pathogen, Schistosoma mansoni , which alternates between snail intermediate hosts and vertebrate definitive hosts. By manipulating parasite exposure and community diversity, we show that heterospecific communities cause a 25–50 per cent reduction in infection among snail hosts ( Biomphalaria glabrata ). Infected snails raised alongside non-host snails ( Lymnaea or Helisoma sp.) also produced 60–80 per cent fewer cercariae, suggesting that diverse communities could reduce human infection risk. Because focal host density was held constant during experiments, decreases in transmission resulted entirely from diversity-mediated pathways. Finally, the decrease in infection in mixed-species communities led to an increase in reproductive output by hosts, representing a novel example of parasite-mediated facilitation. Our results underscore the significance of community structure on transmission of complex life-cycle pathogens, and we emphasize enhanced integration between ecological and parasitological research on the diversity–disease relationship.


2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 241-260 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aliya Sorgen

AbstractThe integration of refugees/asylum seekers is a complex process that is affected by factors such as reasons for fleeing one’s home country, linguistic proficiency, education, housing issues, and reception from the host community. While past research has focused on these issues, there is a lack of attention on the development of practical and psychological integration skills through participation in a social space ofmutual accommodation(Berry 2005). This article fills this gap by analysing the relationship between mutual accommodation and integration in relation to spaces for language acquisition and the resulting impact of participation. This study illustrates, from the migrant perspective, how language acquisition in terms of resettlement not only focuses on linguistic proficiency but also on how such spaces provide a supportive place of refuge and support. This research underscores a deeper discussion of the migrantnew speakerprofile, providing evidence for ways in which to broaden an understanding of this key shift away from previously held notions of thenativeversusnon-nativeindividual. Ethnographic research was conducted in two UK-based conversation clubs. Data analysis followed Braun and Clarke’s (2006) Thematic Analysis structure.


Author(s):  
Erle C. Ellis

Humanity’s impact on the planet has been profound. From fire, intensive hunting, and agriculture, it has accelerated into rapid climate change, widespread pollution, plastic accumulation, species invasions, and the mass extinction of species—changes that have left a permanent mark in the geological record of the rocks. Yet the proposal for a new unit of geological time—the Anthropocene Epoch—has raised debate far beyond the scientific community. The Anthropocene has emerged as a powerful new narrative of the relationship between humans and nature. Anthropocene: A Very Short Introduction draws on the work of geologists, geographers, environmental scientists, archaeologists, and humanities scholars to explain the science and wider implications of the Anthropocene.


2019 ◽  
Vol 286 (1902) ◽  
pp. 20190260 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pieter T. J. Johnson ◽  
Dana M. Calhoun ◽  
Tawni Riepe ◽  
Travis McDevitt-Galles ◽  
Janet Koprivnikar

Debates over the relationship between biodiversity and disease dynamics underscore the need for a more mechanistic understanding of how changes in host community composition influence parasite transmission. Focusing on interactions between larval amphibians and trematode parasites, we experimentally contrasted the effects of host richness and species composition to identify the individual and joint contributions of both parameters on the infection levels of three trematode species. By combining experimental approaches with field surveys from 147 ponds, we further evaluated how richness effects differed between randomized and realistic patterns of species loss (i.e. community disassembly). Our results indicated that community-level changes in infection levels were owing to host species composition, rather than richness. However, when composition patterns mirrored empirical observations along a natural assembly gradient, each added host species reduced infection success by 12–55%. No such effects occurred when assemblages were randomized. Mechanistically, these patterns were due to non-random host species assembly/disassembly: while highly competent species predominated in low diversity systems, less susceptible hosts became progressively more common as richness increased. These findings highlight the potential for combining information on host traits and assembly patterns to forecast diversity-mediated changes in multi-host disease systems.


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