Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 4, 2026

07:41
Modeling the Size Spectrum for Macroinvertebrates and Fishes in Stream Ecosystems
Published on: July 30, 2019
Correction to one of MacArthur's species-abundance formulas
Abstract:
The expected relative abundances of the commoner species in a biological population are less if the niches are overlapping than if they are non-overlapping. MacArthur's mathematical arguments, which lead to the opposite conclusion, are incorrect.
Related Concept Videos
Formation of Species
Speciation describes the formation of one or more new species from one or sometimes multiple original species. The resulting species are discrete from the parent species, and barriers to reproduction will typically exist. There are two primary mechanisms, speciation with and without geographic isolation—allopatric and sympatric speciation, respectively.Allopatric SpeciationIn allopatric speciation, gene flow between two populations of the same species is prevented by a geographic barrier, like...
Speciation Rates
Speciation can proceed at markedly different rates, and evolutionary biologists commonly describe these differences through the models of gradualism and punctuated equilibrium. Both patterns explain how new species arise, but they differ in the tempo and continuity of evolutionary change. In both cases, evolutionary change arises from heritable variation within populations, with natural selection often shaping traits that improve survival and reproduction under specific environmental conditions.
Conservation of Small Populations
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...
Conservation of Declining Populations
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.
Testing a Claim about Mean: Unknown Population SD
A complete procedure of testing a hypothesis about a population mean when the population standard deviation is unknown is explained here.
Estimating a population mean requires the samples to be approximately normally distributed. The data should be collected from the randomly selected samples having no sampling bias. There is no specific requirement for sample size. But if the sample size is less than 30, and we don't know the population standard deviation, a different approach is used; instead...
Estimating a population mean requires the samples to be approximately normally distributed. The data should be collected from the randomly selected samples having no sampling bias. There is no specific requirement for sample size. But if the sample size is less than 30, and we don't know the population standard deviation, a different approach is used; instead...
One-Compartment Open Model: Wagner-Nelson and Loo Riegelman Method for ka Estimation
This lesson introduces two critical methods in pharmacokinetics, the Wagner-Nelson and Loo-Riegelman methods, used for estimating the absorption rate constant (ka) for drugs administered via non-intravenous routes. The Wagner-Nelson method relates ka to the plasma concentration derived from the slope of a semilog percent unabsorbed time plot. However, it is limited to drugs with one-compartment kinetics and can be impacted by factors like gastrointestinal motility or enzymatic degradation.
On...
On...

