Senckenberg Society for Nature Research

Limnephilidae is a species-rich and ecologically diverse family within the tube case making clade of caddisflies (Trichoptera). Species occur across a wide range of habitats, from cold headwater streams to stagnant pools to terrestrial environments. H

Introduction: Oceans cover over 70% of Earth’s surface (Cael et al. 2023). An estimated 2.2 million marine species exist, yet nearly 80% remain undescribed (Mora et al. 2011). Around 370,000 species are accepted in the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), but open-access occurrence data exists for only about 200,000 in the Ocean Biodiversity Information System (OBIS). Documenting marine biodiversity is vital for making evidence-based policy and management decisions in order to maintain ecosystem stability and planetary health. Initiatives such as the Census of Marine Life and open-access databases like OBIS continue to transform understanding and support the UN Decade of Ocean Science. Through data sharing and global collaboration, we can better estimate and conserve marine biodiversity by first identifying data and knowledge gaps. Methods: In two underrepresented areas, the South-West Pacific (SWP) and the Indian Ocean (IO), the current biodiversity patterns of fauna were mapped to identify the knowledge gaps and distribution patterns by depth zones. All occurrence data (Animalia) were extracted from the OBIS and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). The occurrence records were quality-controlled in accordance with the OBIS data quality guidelines (OBIS 2025). Only accepted marine taxa were retained after cross-referencing species names with the WoRMS. In total, 5,441,962 occurrence records in the SWP and 7,768,826 occurrence records in the IO were used in this study (Suppl. material 1). Results: The number of occurrence records decreased with depth in all taxa in both oceans. More than 60% of the occurrence records with available depth information were from shallow waters (0–200 m), highlighting significant knowledge gaps in deep-sea biodiversity. Still, more than 11 million km² of the SWP and IO had fewer than 50 occurrence records after data cleaning in the shallow waters. Based on 5-degree latitudinal bands, the higher latitudes of the SWP (0–25°S) were less sampled or the data were not reported, compared to the lower latitudes. Mid-latitudes of the SWP (30–45°S, eastern and western Australia) had the greatest distribution records, mostly related to Chordata, followed by Arthropoda and Mollusca. However, 10–25°S latitudes of the SWP had the highest number of reported species, mostly associated with Chordata, followed by Mollusca and Arthropoda. The mid-latitudes of the IO (5–30°S) were less sampled, or the data were not reported, compared to the upper and lower latitudes. Chordata occurrence records were the exception, with a peak at 10–25°S latitudes showing the highest distribution records, followed by Arthropoda. Also, 10–20°S latitudes of the IO had the greatest number of species, mostly related to Chordata, followed by Arthropoda and Mollusca (Suppl. material 2) and (Suppl. material 3). Application: The generated knowledge is crucial for strengthening biodiversity monitoring and ensuring rapid, accessible information for policymakers through science-policy interfaces such as the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), thereby supporting the development of urgent conservation strategies for underrepresented and threatened marine ecosystems, such as the SWP and the IO, before it is too late.

Conservation translocations are increasingly used in species’ recovery. Their success often depends upon maintaining or restoring survival-relevant behaviour, which is socially learned in many animals. A lack of species- or population-appropriate learning can lead to the loss of adaptive behaviour, increasing the likelihood of negative human interactions and compromising animals’ ability to migrate, exploit resources, avoid predators, integrate into wild populations, reproduce and survive. When applied well, behavioural tools can address deficiencies in socially learned behaviours and boost survival. However, their use has been uneven between species and translocation programmes, and behaviour commonly contributes to translocation failure. Critically, current international guidance (e.g. the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s translocation guidelines) does not directly discuss social learning or its facilitation. We argue that linking knowledge about social learning to appropriate translocation strategies will enhance guidance and direct future research. We offer a framework for incorporating animal social learning into translocation planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation across wild and captive settings. Our recommendations consider barriers practitioners face in contending with logistics, time constraints and intervention cost. We emphasize that stronger links between researchers, translocation practitioners and wildlife agencies would increase support for social learning research, and improve the perceived relevance and feasibility of facilitating social learning.This article is part of the theme issue ‘Animal culture: conservation in a changing world’.

Abstract. Photosynthesis, growth, and plant maintenance respiration are closely related to tree tissue nitrogen (N) concentrations. While earlier studies of the variation in tissue N concentrations and underlying controls have mostly focused on leaves, here we identify the large-scale controls of N concentration in other tree compartments for the first time. This is achieved by constructing and analysing a novel database of N concentrations in stems, roots, and branches covering all common Northern Hemisphere boreal and temperate tree genera, combined with data for leaves mostly from existing databases. This database allows us to explore the large-scale abiotic (climate, soil N concentration) and biotic controls (tree age/size, leaf type, growth rate) of tree tissue N concentration. We find that N concentrations decrease with increasing tree age (or size) and are significantly higher in deciduous compared to evergreen trees in all tissues. Low growth rates or unfavourable climate conditions (very cold or dry climate) significantly decrease leaf (the latter only for needleleaf deciduous and needleleaf evergreen trees) but not stem N concentration, indicating their effects on N allocation. Plant traits and environmental conditions together explain very large parts of the variation in tissue N concentrations. These results suggest that changes in the distribution of tree age/size, species, and extreme climate, induced by climate change, forest management, or disturbances, will have substantial consequences for the carbon (C) sequestration potential of boreal and temperate forests by altering tissue N concentrations. We expect that the expansion of tree species better adapted to dry conditions in European temperate forests will result in a higher N concentration in all tree tissues and elevated N allocation fractions to stems, which might lead to higher productivity but also higher maintenance respiration. The identified relationships need to be represented in dynamic global vegetation models (DGVMs) to estimate future effects of N limitation on the C cycle.

The Horizon Europe project “Biodiversity Digital Twin for Advanced Modelling, Simulation and Prediction Capabilities” (biodt.eu) combines state-of-the-art supercomputing resources with FAIR data practices to address biodiversity grand challenges such as the loss of diversity at genetic, species and ecosystem levels driven by factors such as anthropogenic climate change, intensified land use and the spreading of alien invasive species.Key tools for the integration and assessment of such information in BioDT are so-called prototype Digital Twins (pDTs) which provide digital replicas of particular phenomena of the biosphere. The data produced by pDTs and the computational workflows themselves are annotated with rich machine-interpretable metadata, notably schema.org and its Bioschemas and Croissant (high-level metadata format for machine learning datasets) extensions to enable discovery and interaction with the data for humans and machines. The crop wild relatives digital twin developed in BioDT for the identification of novel genetic resources in crop wild relatives (CWR) aims to support the development of mitigation strategies against food-related crises associated with climate change (doi:10.3897/rio.10.e125192). Underutilised crops and CWR are a valuable source of untapped genetic diversity for implementing such strategies because their greater genetic diversity in relation to crops makes adaptation to droughts, cold waves, heavy precipitation or other weather-induced extreme events possible. They are therefore of particular importance to guarantee food security.  We developed a pilot study to migrate and functionally integrate the pDT CWR in the Destination Earth Data Lake (DEDL) to increase its availability and, more importantly, use both data provided in the data space and the near data processing features of DEDL to improve models and prediction. The framework makes use of web-based technologies such as RO-Crates and FAIR Signposting to facilitate reuse and repurposing of the data within and across different data spaces as well as orchestrated interplay of multiple digital twins (involving the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin). Building on this blueprint, we will showcase in this presentation the deployment of FAIR agrobiodiversity workflows in DEDL’s compute service Islet and the subsequent publication of results in a lightweight service framework (figure).

The relationship between climate and human evolution is complex, and the causal mechanisms remain unknown. Here, we review and synthesize what is currently known about climate forcings on African landscapes, focusing mainly on the last 4 million years. We use information derived from marine sediment archives and data-numerical climate model comparisons and integration. There exists a heterogeneity in pan-African hydroclimate changes, forced by a combination of orbitally paced, low-latitude fluctuations in insolation; polar ice volume changes; tropical sea surface temperature gradients linked to the Walker circulation; and possibly greenhouse gases. Pan-African vegetation changes do not follow the same pattern, which is suggestive of additional influences, such as CO2 and temperature. We caution against reliance on temporal correlations between global or regional climate, environmental changes, and human evolution and briefly proffer some ideas on how pan-African climate trends could help create novel conceptual frameworks to determine the causal mechanisms of associations between climate/habitat change and hominin evolution.

Cyclic peptides exhibit diverse bioactivities and are distinguished by their enhanced cell permeability, improved proteolytic stability, and increased binding affinity due to their conformational rigidity. Despite significant advancements in peptide synthesis, the production of complex cyclic peptides remains a challenge. Nature has evolved diverse strategies for peptide cyclization, with an ever-growing repertoire of characterized cyclases involved in the biosynthesis of ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs). These enzymes convert linear precursor peptides into complex (poly-)cyclic structures. The discovery of the atropopeptides has significantly expanded the chemical diversity of RiPPs with unique (poly-)cyclic structures. In this study, we employed a phylogeny-guided approach to identify a substrate-promiscuous cytochrome P450 macrocyclase that catalyzes the formation of cyclic peptides through atropospecific C–N or C–C bond formation between aromatic amino acid side chains. Combinatorial biosynthetic studies revealed that ScaB encoded in the scabrirubin biosynthetic gene cluster efficiently cyclizes a wide range of atropopeptide precursor peptides. Furthermore, extensive site-directed mutagenesis studies of the tetrapeptide core sequence further expanded the diversity of atropopeptides. Notably, three tested atropopeptides show antiviral activity and one of the non-natural atropopeptides displays anti-inflammatory activity. Our findings establish a broadly substrate-tolerant atropopeptide-modifying P450 as a versatile biocatalyst for the synthesis of bioactive, biaryl-bridged macrocyclic peptides.