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Conservation of Declining Populations02:07

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Conservation of declining population focuses on ways of detecting, diagnosing, and halting a population decline. The approach uses methods to prevent populations from going extinct.
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Population size is dynamic, increasing with birth rates and immigration, and decreasing with death rates and emigration. In ideal conditions with unlimited resources, populations can increase exponentially, which plots as a J-shaped growth rate curve of population size against time. This type of curve is characteristic of newly-introduced invasive species, or populations that have suffered catastrophic declines and are rebounding.However, realistic environmental conditions limit the number of...
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Small population sizes put a species at extreme risk of extinction due to a lack of variation, and a consequent decrease in adaptability. This weakens the chances of survival under pressures such as climate change, competition from other species, or new diseases. Large populations are more likely to survive pressures such as these, as such populations are more likely to harbor individuals that have genetic variants that are adaptive under new stresses. Small populations are much less likely to...
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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 19, 2026

Optimized Bone Sampling Protocols for the Retrieval of Ancient DNA from Archaeological Remains
06:18

Optimized Bone Sampling Protocols for the Retrieval of Ancient DNA from Archaeological Remains

Published on: November 30, 2021

Coin hoards speak of population declines in Ancient Rome.

Peter Turchin1, Walter Scheidel

  • 1Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269, USA. peter.turchin@uconn.edu

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
|October 7, 2009
PubMed
Summary

The frequency of unrecovered coin hoards reveals the intensity of Roman internal warfare. This analysis suggests the Roman citizen population declined in Italy during the first century BCE, contradicting vigorous growth theories.

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Area of Science:

  • Archaeology
  • Roman History
  • Demography

Background:

  • The Roman Republic experienced significant civil wars in the first century BCE.
  • Population estimates for this period vary, with debate on census counts (adult males vs. entire citizenry).
  • Sociopolitical instability is historically linked to population decline.

Observation:

  • Unrecovered coin hoards serve as a proxy for the intensity of internal warfare.
  • The temporal distribution of these hoards can indicate periods of high conflict and instability.
  • Data prior to 100 BCE was used to model the relationship between instability and population dynamics.

Findings:

  • A model was fitted to data before 100 BCE, quantifying the impact of instability (hoard frequency) on population.
  • The model predicts a population decline in Italy after 100 BCE.
  • This finding challenges the hypothesis of significant population growth during this turbulent era.

Implications:

  • Resolves a long-standing controversy regarding Roman population trends in the first century BCE.
  • Provides a novel method for reconstructing demographic history using archaeological evidence.
  • Highlights the severe demographic consequences of widespread internal conflict in ancient societies.