Observational natural history and morphological taxonomy are indispensable for future challenges in biodiversity and conservation
Publikation: Beiträge in Zeitschriften › Zeitschriftenaufsätze › Forschung › begutachtet
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in: Communicative and Integrative Biology, Jahrgang 8, Nr. 1, e992745, 2015.
Publikation: Beiträge in Zeitschriften › Zeitschriftenaufsätze › Forschung › begutachtet
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Observational natural history and morphological taxonomy are indispensable for future challenges in biodiversity and conservation
AU - Staab, Michael
AU - Ohl, Michael
AU - Zhu, Chao Dong
AU - Klein, Alexandra Maria
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2015 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
PY - 2015
Y1 - 2015
N2 - Global biodiversity is rapidly declining, leading inevitably to a loss of ecosystem functionality when species and their associated life-history traits vanish. Unfortunately, even in the 21st century, a large proportion of Earth's species are yet unknown and also for most described species science lacks a deeper understanding of the functional role of species and thus of ecosystems. In this Addendum we use the recent discovery of a new spider wasp with a unique natural history as an example to emphasize the importance to conduct basic observational natural history and traditional taxonomic research. We aim to encourage such 'old-fashioned' research and biologists from various research fields to report the many fascinating phenomena holding valuable natural history information they may encounter. Such detailed knowledge on species, their life-history traits, and their trophic interactions will be crucial to reliably address the challenges global change brings to the persistence of ecosystems.
AB - Global biodiversity is rapidly declining, leading inevitably to a loss of ecosystem functionality when species and their associated life-history traits vanish. Unfortunately, even in the 21st century, a large proportion of Earth's species are yet unknown and also for most described species science lacks a deeper understanding of the functional role of species and thus of ecosystems. In this Addendum we use the recent discovery of a new spider wasp with a unique natural history as an example to emphasize the importance to conduct basic observational natural history and traditional taxonomic research. We aim to encourage such 'old-fashioned' research and biologists from various research fields to report the many fascinating phenomena holding valuable natural history information they may encounter. Such detailed knowledge on species, their life-history traits, and their trophic interactions will be crucial to reliably address the challenges global change brings to the persistence of ecosystems.
KW - BEF-China
KW - Ecosystem functioning
KW - Global change
KW - Integrative taxonomy
KW - Species extinctions
KW - Species interactions
KW - Trait characteristics
KW - Biology
KW - Ecosystems Research
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84925949923&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.4161/19420889.2014.992745
DO - 10.4161/19420889.2014.992745
M3 - Journal articles
AN - SCOPUS:84925949923
VL - 8
JO - Communicative and Integrative Biology
JF - Communicative and Integrative Biology
SN - 1942-0889
IS - 1
M1 - e992745
ER -