Humans are shaping environments at an accelerating rate. 

Animals that migrate north to breed are being put at risk by ongoing climate change and increasing human pressure, losing earlier advantages for migration, declining in numbers and faring much worse than their resident counterparts, according to scientists writing in Trends in Ecology & Evolution.

Research has shed new light on the impact of humans on islands’ biodiversity. 

Sixty-three percent. That’s the proportion of mammal species that vanished from Africa and the Arabian Peninsula around 30 million years ago, after Earth’s climate shifted from swampy to icy. 

Whether birds get caged in the eye of a hurricane may depend on the intensity and totality of the chaos beyond the calm, says a novel study from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s Matthew Van Den Broeke.

Urbanisation appears to be another key factor for insect decline. 

In a new paper published in the Journal of Applied Ecology, environmental science and management professor Elise Granek and lead author Casey Lewis, PSU alumna, report the findings of a census of zooplankton communities in non-native mangrove habitats and open coastline on the island of Moloka'i, Hawaii. 

With warming climate, summer sea ice in the Arctic has been shrinking fast, and now consistently spans less than half the area it did in the early 1980s. 

For many marine animals, like the Dungeness crab, seasonality and timing are components of complex life cycles, where disruptions can have serious implications for the population. 

By reflecting sunlight back into space and controlling rainfall, clouds play significant roles in the global climate.