Dataset Information

Recent ecological responses to climate change support predictions of high extinction risk.

ABSTRACT: Predicted effects of climate change include high extinction risk for many species, but confidence in these predictions is undermined by a perceived lack of empirical support. Many studies have now documented ecological responses to recent climate change, providing the opportunity to test whether the magnitude and nature of recent responses match predictions. Here, we perform a global and multitaxon metaanalysis to show that empirical evidence for the realized effects of climate change supports predictions of future extinction risk. We use International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List criteria as a common scale to estimate extinction risks from a wide range of climate impacts, ecological responses, and methods of analysis, and we compare predictions with observations. Mean extinction probability across studies making predictions of the future effects of climate change was 7% by 2100 compared with 15% based on observed responses. After taking account of possible bias in the type of climate change impact analyzed and the parts of the world and taxa studied, there was less discrepancy between the two approaches: predictions suggested a mean extinction probability of 10% across taxa and regions, whereas empirical evidence gave a mean probability of 14%. As well as mean overall extinction probability, observations also supported predictions in terms of variability in extinction risk and the relative risk associated with broad taxonomic groups and geographic regions. These results suggest that predictions are robust to methodological assumptions and provide strong empirical support for the assertion that anthropogenic climate change is now a major threat to global biodiversity.

SUBMITTER: Maclean IM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3145734 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Recent ecological responses to climate change support predictions of high extinction risk.

Maclean Ilya M D IM Wilson Robert J RJ

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20110711 30

Predicted effects of climate change include high extinction risk for many species, but confidence in these predictions is undermined by a perceived lack of empirical support. Many studies have now documented ecological responses to recent climate change, providing the opportunity to test whether the magnitude and nature of recent responses match predictions. Here, we perform a global and multitaxon metaanalysis to show that empirical evidence for the realized effects of climate change supports p ...[more]

PMID: 21746924

Similar Datasets

Project description:Documenting effects of climate change is an important step towards designing mitigation and adaptation responses. Impacts of climate change on terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystems have been well-documented in the Northern Hemisphere, but long-term data to detect change in the Southern Hemisphere are limited, and some types of change are generally difficult to measure. Here we present a novel approach using local ecological knowledge to facilitate a continent-scale view of climate change impacts on terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystems that people have perceived in Australia. We sought local knowledge using a national web-based survey, targeting respondents with close links to the environment (e.g. farmers, ecologists), and using a custom-built mapping tool to ask respondents to describe and attribute recent changes they had observed within an area they knew well. Results drawn from 326 respondents showed that people are already perceiving simple and complex climate change impacts on hundreds of species and ecosystems across Australia, significantly extending the detail previously reported for the continent. While most perceived trends and attributions remain unsubstantiated, >35 reported anecdotes concurred with examples in the literature, and >20 were reported more than once. More generally, anecdotes were compatible with expectations from global climate change impact frameworks, including examples across the spectrum from organisms (e.g. increased mortality in >75 species), populations (e.g. changes in recruitment or abundance in >100 species, phenological change in >50 species), and species (e.g. >80 species newly arriving or disappearing), to communities and landscapes (e.g. >50 examples of altered ecological interactions). The overarching pattern indicated by the anecdotes suggests that people are more often noticing climate change losers (typically native species) than winners in their local areas, but with observations of potential 'adaptation in action' via compositional and phenological change and through arrivals and range shifts (particularly for native birds and exotic plants). A high proportion of climate change-related anecdotes also involved cumulative or interactive effects of land use. We conclude that targeted elicitation of local ecological knowledge about climate change impacts can provide a valuable complement to data-derived knowledge, substantially extending the volume of explicit examples and offering a foundation for further investigation.

Project description:BackgroundClimate change is increasingly being implicated in species' range shifts throughout the world, including those of important vector and reservoir species for infectious diseases. In North America (México, United States, and Canada), leishmaniasis is a vector-borne disease that is autochthonous in México and Texas and has begun to expand its range northward. Further expansion to the north may be facilitated by climate change as more habitat becomes suitable for vector and reservoir species for leishmaniasis.Methods and findingsThe analysis began with the construction of ecological niche models using a maximum entropy algorithm for the distribution of two sand fly vector species (Lutzomyia anthophora and L. diabolica), three confirmed rodent reservoir species (Neotoma albigula, N. floridana, and N. micropus), and one potential rodent reservoir species (N. mexicana) for leishmaniasis in northern México and the United States. As input, these models used species' occurrence records with topographic and climatic parameters as explanatory variables. Models were tested for their ability to predict correctly both a specified fraction of occurrence points set aside for this purpose and occurrence points from an independently derived data set. These models were refined to obtain predicted species' geographical distributions under increasingly strict assumptions about the ability of a species to disperse to suitable habitat and to persist in it, as modulated by its ecological suitability. Models successful at predictions were fitted to the extreme A2 and relatively conservative B2 projected climate scenarios for 2020, 2050, and 2080 using publicly available interpolated climate data from the Third Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Report. Further analyses included estimation of the projected human population that could potentially be exposed to leishmaniasis in 2020, 2050, and 2080 under the A2 and B2 scenarios. All confirmed vector and reservoir species will see an expansion of their potential range towards the north. Thus, leishmaniasis has the potential to expand northwards from México and the southern United States. In the eastern United States its spread is predicted to be limited by the range of L. diabolica; further west, L. anthophora may play the same role. In the east it may even reach the southern boundary of Canada. The risk of spread is greater for the A2 scenario than for the B2 scenario. Even in the latter case, with restrictive (contiguous) models for dispersal of vector and reservoir species, and limiting vector and reservoir species occupancy to only the top 10% of their potential suitable habitat, the expected number of human individuals exposed to leishmaniasis by 2080 will at least double its present value.ConclusionsThese models predict that climate change will exacerbate the ecological risk of human exposure to leishmaniasis in areas outside its present range in the United States and, possibly, in parts of southern Canada. This prediction suggests the adoption of measures such as surveillance for leishmaniasis north of Texas as disease cases spread northwards. Potential vector and reservoir control strategies-besides direct intervention in disease cases-should also be further investigated.

Dataset Information

Recent ecological responses to climate change support predictions of high extinction risk.

Publications

Recent ecological responses to climate change support predictions of high extinction risk.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets