Abstract
Rapid environmental changes are threatening biodiversity and exposing species to novel ecological and evolutionary pressures. The scientific community increasingly recognizes the need for dynamic models integrating sufficient complexity both to improve our understanding of species' responses to environmental changes and to inform effective management strategies.
Using three illustrative examples, we introduce a novel modelling platform, RangeShifter, which integrates complex population dynamics and dispersal behaviour, includes plastic and evolutionary processes and simulates scenarios on spatially explicit landscapes. The software provides functionality for a wide variety of modelling applications ranging from applied questions, where it can be parameterized for real landscapes and species to compare alternative potential management interventions, to purely theoretical studies of species' eco-evolutionary dynamics and responses to different environmental pressures.
RangeShifter provides an important tool for facilitating the advancement of ecological theory on species' spatial dynamics in response to environmental changes, and linking it directly to application in biodiversity conservation.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 388-396 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | Methods in Ecology and Evolution |
| Volume | 5 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Early online date | 20 Jan 2014 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Apr 2014 |
Bibliographical note
Funded byEuropean Commission as a Large-scale Integrating Project. Grant Number: 226 852
Keywords
- population dynamics
- population viability
- dispersal
- dynamic modelling
- environmental change
- individual-based modelling
- connectivity
- climate-change
- structured populations
- range expansions
- biodiversity
- movement
- conservation
- ecology
- biogeography
- prediction
Access to Document
Fingerprint
Dive into the research topics of 'RangeShifter: a platform for modelling spatial eco-evolutionary dynamics and species' responses to environmental changes'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.Profiles
-
Justin Travis
- Biological Sciences, Aberdeen Centre For Environmental Sustainability - Personal Chair
- Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS) - Professor
Person: Academic