Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Global Climate Change

Global Climate Change

Throughout its ~4.5 billion year history, the Earth has experienced periods of warming and cooling. However, the current drastic increase in global temperatures is well outside of the Earth’s cyclic norms, and evidence for human-caused global climate change is compelling. Paleoclimatology, the study of ancient climate conditions, provides ample evidence for human-caused global climate change by comparing recent conditions with those in the past.

What is Climate?

What is Climate?

Climate refers to the prevailing weather conditions in a specific area over an extended period. As the saying goes, “Climate is what you expect. Weather is what you get.” Climate is influenced by geographic factors, such as latitude, terrain, and proximity to bodies of water.

Threats to Biodiversity

Threats to Biodiversity

There have been five major extinction events throughout geological history, resulting in the elimination of biodiversity, followed by a rebound of species that adapted to the new conditions. In the current geological epoch, the Holocene, there is a sixth extinction event in progress. This mass extinction has been attributed to human activities and is thus provisionally called the Anthropocene. In 2019 the human population reached 7.7 billion people and is projected to comprise 10 billion by...

Distribution and Dispersion

Distribution and Dispersion

To understand intra-specific interactions in populations, scientists measure the spatial arrangement of species individuals. This geographic arrangement is known as the species distribution or dispersion. Highly territorial species exhibit a uniform distribution pattern, in which individuals are spaced at relatively equal distances from one another. Species that are highly tied to particular resources, such as food or shelter, tend to concentrate around those resources, and thus exhibit a...

Speciation Rates

Speciation Rates

What is Biodiversity?

What is Biodiversity?

Biodiversity describes the variety of living things at multiple organizational levels: genetic, species and ecosystem diversity. Species diversity includes all branches of the evolutionary tree from single-celled prokaryotic organisms, bacteria, and archaea, to the eukaryotic kingdoms: plants; animals; fungi; and protists. To date, there have been about 1.75 million species identified, and new species are discovered every week.

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

AI, Comparative Advantage, and the Next Decade of Ecological Research.

Ecology letters·2026

Same author

Two decades of resurrection studies: What have we learned about contemporary evolution of plant species?

American journal of botany·2026

Same author

Complete Genome Sequences of the Diamondback Terrapin, Eastern Mudsnail, and their Shared Fluke Parasite (<i>Pleurogonius malaclemys</i>).

Biodiversity genomes·2026

Same author

Genetic Rescue: Latest Advances and Applications.

Evolutionary applications·2026

Same author

A single autoregressive integrated moving average with exogenous variable outperforms ensembles of autoregressive models for forecasting influenza hospitalizations in the contiguous United States.

Journal of the Royal Society, Interface·2026

Same author

Can vaccine-preventable disease resurgence be anticipated? Leading indicators and tipping points.

Future microbiology·2026

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 23, 2025

Using Generative Art to Convey Past and Future Climate Transitions

Using Generative Art to Convey Past and Future Climate Transitions

Published on: March 31, 2023

Two Hypotheses About Climate Change and Species Distributions.

John M Drake^1,2, John P Wares^1,2,3, James E Byers^1,2

¹Odum School of Ecology, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA.

Ecology Letters

|May 9, 2025

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Global climate change is altering species distributions. This study introduces two hypotheses on how environmental variability, not just average conditions, impacts species

Keywords:

climate change global change macroecology species distribution

More Related Videos

Field-Based Thermal Physiology Assay: Cold Shock Recovery under Ambient Conditions

Field-Based Thermal Physiology Assay: Cold Shock Recovery under Ambient Conditions

Published on: March 9, 2021

Integrating Remote Sensing with Species Distribution Models; Mapping Tamarisk Invasions Using the Software for Assisted Habitat Modeling SAHM

Integrating Remote Sensing with Species Distribution Models; Mapping Tamarisk Invasions Using the Software for Assisted Habitat Modeling SAHM

Published on: October 11, 2016

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: May 23, 2025

Using Generative Art to Convey Past and Future Climate Transitions

Using Generative Art to Convey Past and Future Climate Transitions

Published on: March 31, 2023

Field-Based Thermal Physiology Assay: Cold Shock Recovery under Ambient Conditions

Field-Based Thermal Physiology Assay: Cold Shock Recovery under Ambient Conditions

Published on: March 9, 2021

Integrating Remote Sensing with Species Distribution Models; Mapping Tamarisk Invasions Using the Software for Assisted Habitat Modeling SAHM

Integrating Remote Sensing with Species Distribution Models; Mapping Tamarisk Invasions Using the Software for Assisted Habitat Modeling SAHM

Published on: October 11, 2016

Area of Science:

Macroecology and Biogeography
Climate Change Ecology
Environmental Variability Studies

Background:

Global climate change is driving significant shifts in species distributions worldwide.
Current research primarily examines changes in mean climate conditions, neglecting the impact of increased environmental variability.
Understanding species' responses to environmental variability is crucial for predicting future biogeographic patterns.

Purpose of the Study:

To propose two novel macroecological hypotheses: the variability damping hypothesis and the variability adaptation hypothesis.
To explore how ecological dynamics and evolutionary history influence species' responses to climate-driven environmental variability.
To provide a framework for understanding and testing the effects of environmental variability on species distributions across ecosystems.

Main Methods:

Formulation of two competing macroecological hypotheses regarding species' responses to environmental variability.
Discussion of existing evidence in relation to the proposed hypotheses.
Proposal of empirical testing strategies for the hypotheses.

Main Results:

The variability damping hypothesis predicts less impact from temperature variability on deep-water species compared to nearshore, intertidal, and terrestrial species.
The variability adaptation hypothesis predicts the opposite trend, suggesting greater impact on deep-water species.
The paper outlines how current data can be used to evaluate these contrasting predictions.

Conclusions:

Two new hypotheses offer contrasting predictions for how species distributions will respond to increasing climate-driven environmental variability.
The hypotheses highlight the importance of considering both ecological dynamics and evolutionary history in macroecological studies.
Further empirical testing is needed to determine whether species distributions are dampened or adapted to environmental variability under climate change.