Soil systems are being increasingly exposed to the interactive effects of biological invasions and climate change, with rising temperatures expected to benefit alien over indigenous species. We assessed this expectation for an important soil-dwelling group, the springtails, by determining whether alien species show broader thermal tolerance limits and greater tolerance to climate warming than t...

Although it is increasingly clear that exotic invasive species affect seed-dispersal mutualisms, a synthetic examination of the effect of exotic invasive species on seed-dispersal mutualisms is lacking. Here, we review the impacts of the invasive Argentine ant (Linepithema humile) on seed dispersal. We found that sites with L. humile had 92 per cent fewer native ant seed dispersers than did sit...

Although the number of studies on invasive plants and animals has risen exponentially, little is known about invasive microbes, especially non-pathogenic ones. Microbial invasions by viruses, bacteria, fungi and protists occur worldwide but are much harder to detect than invasions by macroorganisms. Invasive microbes have the potential to significantly alter community structure and ecosystem fu...

invasions. Refuges from the invader often remain at some place in a native species' range. Whether native species can stably persist within these refuges is an open question. But in the short term, the number of invasions has far exceeded the number of resulting extinctions. This result has emphasized that most ecological systems are not 'saturated' with species. Two puzzles Nearly all problema...

Although it is increasingly clear that exotic invasive species affect seed-dispersal mutualisms, a synthetic examination of the effect of exotic invasive species on seed-dispersal mutualisms is lacking. Here, we review the impacts of the invasive Argentine ant (Linepithema humile) on seed dispersal. We found that sites with L. humile had 92 per cent fewer native ant seed dispersers than did sit...

Biological invasions and land-use changes are two major causes of the global modifications of biodiversity. Habitat suitability models are the tools of choice to predict potential distributions of invasive species. Although land-use is a key driver of alien species invasions, it is often assumed that land-use is constant in time. Here we combine historical and present day information, to evalua...

Non-native plant invasions can change communities and ecosystems by altering the structure and composition of native vegetation. Changes in native plant communities caused by non-native plants can influence native wildlife species in diverse ways, but the outcomes and underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. Here, we review and synthesize current information for the Intermountain West of th...

The fact that plant invasions are an ongoing process makes generalizations of invasive spread extraordinarily challenging. This is particularly true given the idiosyncratic nature of invasions, in which both historical and local conditions affect establishment success and hinder our ability to generate guidelines for early detection and eradication of invasive species. To overcome these limitat...

The Late Devonian (Frasnian-Famennian) interval includes one of the most dramatic intervals of biotic turnover in the Phanerozoic. Statistical evaluation of diversity change reveals that the primary cause of biodiversity decline was reduced speciation during the crisis interval, not elevated extinction rates. Although various hypotheses have been proposed to explain extinction increase during t...

In recent years, research in invasion biology has focused increasing attention on understanding the role of phenology in shaping plant invasions. Multiple studies have found non-native species that tend to flower distinctly early or late in the growing season, advance more with warming or have shifted earlier with climate change compared with native species. This growing body of literature has ...