Species climate requirements are useful for predicting their geographic distribution. It is often assumed that the niche requirements for invasive plants are conserved during invasion, especially when the invaded regions share similar climate conditions. California and central Chile have a remarkable degree of convergence in their vegetation structure, and a similar Mediterranean climate. Such ...

The ecological niche is the set of environments in which a population of a species can persist without introduction of individuals from other locations. A good mathematical or computational representation of the niche is a prerequisite to addressing many questions in ecology, biogeography, evolutionary biology and conservation. A particularly challenging question for ecological niche modelling ...

Interspecific competition is a dominant force in animal communities that induces niche shifts in ecological and evolutionary time. If competition occurs, niche expansion can be expected when the competitor disappears because resources previously inaccessible due to competitive constraints can then be exploited (i.e., ecological release). Here, we aimed to determine the potential effects of inte...

Isotopic niche has typically been characterized through carbon and nitrogen ratios and most modeling approaches are limited to two dimensions. Yet, other stable isotopes can provide additional power to resolve questions associated with foraging, migration, dispersal and variations in resource use. The ellipse niche model was recently generalized to n-dimensions. We present an analogous methodol...

Plasma cells (PCs) are the main antibody-producing cells in humans. They are long-lived so that specific antibodies against either pathogens or vaccines are produced for decades. PC longevity is attributed to specific areas within the bone marrow micro-environment, the so-called 'niche', providing the cells with required growth and survival factors. With antigen encounters, e.g. infection or va...

This paper advances newmethods for ecosystemic approaches to evolutionary music and art. We explore the biological concept of the niche and its role in evolutionary dynamics, applying it to creative computational systems. Using the process of niche construction organisms are able to change and adapt their environment, and potentially that of other species. Constructed niches may become heritabl...

jajrood protected complex (khojir and sorkheh hesar national parks and jajrood protected area) is one of the most important habitats of central alborz wild sheep (ovis gmelini x o. vignei) in iran. since the species mate in fall, then fall home range has critical rule in life cycle of this species. using the ecological niche factor analysis (enfa), effective factors on the presence of species w...

Ecologists are increasingly adopting an evolutionary perspective, and in recent years, the idea that closely related species are ecologically similar has become widespread. In this regard, phylogenetic signal must be distinguished from phylogenetic niche conservatism. Phylogenetic niche conservatism results when closely related species are more ecologically similar that would be expected based ...

Assessing whether the climatic niche of a species may change between different geographic areas or time periods has become increasingly important in the context of ongoing global change. However, approaches and findings have remained largely controversial so far, calling for a unification of methods. Here, we build on a review of empirical studies of invasion to formalize a unifying framework t...

Niche construction is the process whereby organisms, through their metabolism, activities, and choices, modify their own and/or each other’s niches. Our purpose is to clarify the interactions between evolution and niche construction by focusing on non-linear interactions between genetic and environmental factors shared by interacting species. We constructed a new fitness landscape model termed ...