Students at the forefront of conservation or how community science helps gather data on cavity-nesting bees and wasps, enhancing our understanding of ecosystem interactions.
Can students be the front lines of conservation? A new Canada-wide study, published in Metabarcoding and Metagenomics, suggests they can. The efforts of some 5000 students produced data detailed enough to reveal complex ecological networks hidden inside a small PVC and cardboard tube home.
A trap nest installed at a Bees@Schools community science location. Multiple tubes nested in are visible. Photo credit to Sage Handler.
They invited schools to volunteer across Canada to install standardised ‘trap nests’ – simple PVC pipe and cardboard tube homes that mimic natural cavities where bees and wasps build nests.
Cavity-nesting bees and wasps play key roles in pollination and pest control, yet their distributions and feeding relationships are often poorly known because they can be small, secretive and difficult to observe directly.
Nesting tubes gathered from one trap nest, ready to be cut open and processed. Photo credit to Sage Handler.
Instead of relying only on traditional identification under a microscope, the researchers used DNA metabarcoding – a method that reads DNA from mixed samples and can detect many species at once.
This allowed the team to identify not only which bee or wasp species built each nest, but also which plant pollen or insect prey were brought back as food. The result was a rich, detailed view of both where cavity-nesting bee and wasp species live and how they interact with plants and other insects.
A rainbow of pollen prepared for DNA metabarcoding. Credit: Sage Handler An intact cavity-nesting bee nest extracted from a nesting tube. Credit: Sage Handler (Hill)
A key outcome of the study was the creation of tripartite networks: maps linking (1) the nesting bee or wasp, (2) its food (pollen or insect prey) and (3) parasites. This kind of network is extremely difficult to build through observation alone, but trap nests can act like tiny ecological time capsules.
Every brood cell contains biological traces and metabarcoding can recover them. Students weren’t just collecting insects, they were collecting entire ecological interaction datasets: the raw material needed to build food-web maps across a whole country!
A lot of people want to contribute to conservation or learn more about biodiversity, but don’t know how. This shows that a small, practical action, like hosting a trap nest, can contribute real data that researchers can use. Community and citizen science is becoming more common, so keep an eye out for research happening in your neighbourhood.
says Handler, the lead author of the study
Original resource:
Handler S, Coveny K, Braukmann TWA, Raine NE, Steinke D (2026) Welcome to Hotel Hymenoptera: monitoring cavity-nesting bee and wasp distribution and their trophic interactions using community science and metabarcoding. Metabarcoding and Metagenomics 10: e139674. https://doi.org/10.3897/mbmg.10.139674
In collaboration with the European Union pollinator projects community, scholarly publisher and technology provider Pensoft launchedAdvances in Pollinator Research, a new multidisciplinary, community-driven peer-reviewed journal set to transform how pollinator science is shared and translated into real-world action.
Advances in Pollinator Research(APR) is designed as an innovative platform for the full spectrum of pollinator science, from pollination ecology and pollinator-plant interactions to molecular ecology, conservation and more. A core mission of the journal is to champion research from underrepresented regions, taxa, and ecological contexts.
As a diamond open-access journal, APR is currently free to publish and free to read, ensuring that all published research is openly accessible to the global community. The first editorial of the journal is available here.
In response to the global crisis of pollinator decline, APR moves beyond traditional data silos. It is the first comprehensive platform to unify the biological, environmental, socio-economic, and governance dimensions of pollinator health.
It embraces transdisciplinary collaboration and research between scientists, industry, and society with the aim of finding and amplifying solutions to real-world problems.
APR journal with key information.
Furthermore, the journal welcomes research on conventional approaches while highly encouraging publications that apply innovative methods, such as automated monitoring systems, AI-assisted analytics, molecular and genomic tools, as well as large-scale network initiatives and open databases that advance FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) data dissemination across regions and taxa.
Figure illustrating the scope and publishing process of the APR journal, showing the diversity of pollinators, the multitude of stressors affecting them, and the various stakeholders interacting with them. Credit to Beaurepaire et al., 2026
The journal will utilise Pensoft’s innovative ARPHA platform, known for its robust support of academic publishing and efficient dissemination of research. Thanks to this one-stop publishing solution, the new journal offers a seamless, end-to-end publishing experience, encompassing all stages between manuscript submission and article publication, indexation, dissemination and permanent archiving.
The publishing services provided by ARPHA also include a variety of human-provided services and support and integrations with third-party providers, intended to maximise the reach and usability of scholarly knowledge published in Advances in Pollinator Research.
“We are excited to launch Advances in Pollinator Research. This ambitious journal is set to drive more innovative and interdisciplinary approaches within the field of pollinator science,”
says Prof. Lyubomir Penev, founder and CEO of ARPHA and Pensoft
“With Advances in Pollinator Research, we aim to build an integrative and inclusive home for pollinator science that dissolves disciplinary and geographic silos and connects knowledge from genes to landscapes. Beyond a journal, APR is envisioned as a participatory forum where researchers, practitioners, and communities worldwide co-produce knowledge and accelerate solutions for pollinator health,”
comments Dr. Straub
“We are truly delighted to launch this new transdisciplinary journal focusing on pollinators. Through this effort, we aim to bring our diverse research community together and provide a dynamic platform for scientists and stakeholders to exchange knowledge, ultimately deepening our understanding of and commitment to protecting these precious and fascinating species.,”
adds Dr. Beaurepaire
Advances in Pollinator Research joins a number of open-access entomology journals published by Pensoft.
For more information on the journal’s focus and scope and guidelines to authors, visit APR’s website, subscribe to the journal’s newsletter and follow it on BlueSky,Facebook and Linkedin.
Guest blog post by Dr. Oldemar de Oliveira Carvalho Junior
For four decades, we’ve been quietly watching otters along the southern coast of Brazil. Not just because they’re charismatic and playful, but because they are among nature’s most honest diagnosticians. Just like a doctor checks your pulse, blood, and behavior to assess your health, scientists can use otters to monitor the condition of estuaries, those vital transition zones where rivers meet the sea.
Neotropical otter (Lontra longicaudis). Photo credit to: Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
Otters sit at the top of the food chain in estuaries. They need clean water, healthy fish populations, connected habitats, and safe denning sites. If any of these elements falter, otters are among the first to respond, with fewer sightings, changes in their diet, or markers of disease.
While a water sample offers only a fleeting snapshot, otters aggregate environmental signals across time and space.
Neotropical otter with a cub. Photo credit to Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
In fact, their very presence, or absence, tells a story. In regions where Atlantic Forest fragmentation has severed the connection between land and water, otter sightings have plummeted by 30% in just a decade.
This isn’t just a loss of biodiversity; it’s a warning for everyone downstream. Fewer otters mean degraded waterways, disrupted food webs, and weakened natural buffers against floods and erosion.
A “living record” of pollution
Neotropical otter (Lontra longicaudis) feeding on fish. Video credit to: Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
The diet of otters consists of 70-80% fish, as well as crabs and other aquatic animals. As they consume prey, they also accumulate pollutants, like heavy metals, microplastics, and industrial chemicals, that have built up in those animals. Their bodies effectively become archives of contamination.
Think of an otter as a biological hard drive: by analyzing its scat (feces), we can reconstruct what pollutants are moving through the estuary, even if they’re invisible to the naked eye.
For instance, in Brazil, we’ve found microplastic fibers in otter droppings from protected lagoons, proof that no coastal system is truly isolated from human impact.
The tropical knowledge gap
Neotropical otter. Photo credit to: Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
Globally, over 70% of otter research focuses on temperate species like the Eurasian or sea otter. Meanwhile, the Neotropical otter (Lontra longicaudis) receives less than 4% of scientific attention, despite inhabiting the world’s most biodiverse and threatened estuaries.
This imbalance in the research poses a great conservation risk. Tropical estuaries face unique pressures: rapid urbanization, mangrove deforestation, and climate-driven sea-level rise. Without focused research, we risk managing these ecosystems with tools designed for entirely different environments.
Our work aims to close this divide, establishing the Neotropical otter as a key indicator to drive evidence-based conservation across the Global South.
Land-based diseases in aquatic sentinels
Video from trap camera of two Neotropical otters in a shelter. Video credit to: Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
One of our most striking findings showed that 66% of otters tested positive for Toxoplasma gondii – a parasite shed only by domestic cats. How does a land-based pathogen end up in an aquatic mammal? The answer is through runoff.
The rain washes cat feces from the streets, gardens, and informal settlements into rivers and lagoons. This reveals a sobering truth: even within protected areas, otters are exposed to threats originating far inland. To protect these sentinels of ecosystem health, we must implement integrated management strategies that address sewage overflow, urban runoff, and domestic animal impact.
What comes next?
Neotropical otter inside a shelter. Video credit to: Projeto Lontra / Instituto Ekko Brasil
We’re finalizing the Otter Health Index (OHI), a low-cost toolkit for municipalities, NGOs, and community groups to monitor estuaries using simple metrics: spraint frequency, habitat connectivity, contaminant screening, and local knowledge. It’s designed for places with limited labs but rich ecological insight.
After 40 years of observing otters, we’ve learned this: protecting them isn’t just about saving a species. It’s about safeguarding the intricate web of processes that sustain clean water, fisheries, flood resilience, and human well-being.
Otters aren’t just inhabitants of our estuaries; they are their guardians. If we listen to what they’re telling us, we’ll know exactly what these ecosystems need to survive and thrive.
Original sources:
Carvalho Junior, O., Bez Birolo, A., Tosatti, M., Haddout, S., Ljubenkov, I. and Jayachandran, P.R. eds., (n.d.). Otters as Bioindicators of Estuarine Health: Innovations in Monitoring and Management from Tropical Coastal Brazil. PEstuarine Management and Technologies. doi:https://doi.org/10.3897/emt.coll.317
Birolo, A.B., Tosatti, M., Junior and Assiya Haddout (2026). Otters as bioindicators of estuarine health: Scientific gaps, field-based insights, and a framework for future research. Estuarine Management and Technologies., 3, pp.65–78. doi:https://doi.org/10.3897/emt.3.185117.
On April 20, 2023, a juvenile great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) measuring approximately 210 cm and weighing between 80-90 kg was incidentally caught by local fishermen off the coast of eastern peninsula. This rare encounter, prompted the researchers to dive deep into past records spanning from 1862 to 2023 compiling an extensive review that is now published in the open-access journal Acta Ichthyologica et Piscatoria.
The accidentally caught juvenile great white shark. Photo credit to Báez et al., 2026
The accidental capture – contextualized within a review of records spanning 160 years – revealed that while the Mediterranean great white shark remains as an elusive“ghost” population, it maintains a continued presence in these waters. Currently, the species is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, with a declining population trend.
“Determining the presence of juvenile individuals is of particular importance,” says Dr. José Carlos Báez, the study’s lead researcher. “The occurrence of juvenile specimens raises the question whether active reproduction may be occurring in the region.” He further hypothesized.
The fear of Great White Sharks
Through the examination of records, this study confirms the continued, though sporadic, presence of white sharks in Spanish Mediterranean waters. This research highlights a persistent but infrequent occurrence, with sightings remaining an exceptional event.
Citing H.P. Lovecraft’s famous observation that “the oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” He emphasizes that scientific clarity is the best remedy. “By shedding light on the biology and ecology of the great white shark, research can help replace unfounded myths with genuine understanding.”
Dismantling the Stigma, One Myth at a Time
Video of the accidentally caught great white shark. Credit to Báez et al., 2026
With Great White Shark populations in decline, researchers emphasize that long-term observation programs are vital to understanding the species’ biology in the Mediterranean. By pairing direct sightings with advanced tracking methods, evidence-based strategies can be developed for the conservation of this iconic apex predator.
“The main idea I want to convey to the public is that these large marine animals have a fundamental role in marine ecosystems. As highly migratory pelagic species, they redistribute energy and nutrients across vast distances. They serve as nature’s scavengers – by consuming carrion, they keep ecosystems clean. Even in death, their descent to the seafloor provides a critical pulse of nourishment for deep-sea communities.
concludes Báez.
Research article:
Báez, J.C., Puerto, M.A., Torreblanca, D., Varela, J.L., Carmona, L. and Macías, D. (2026). New record of white shark, Carcharodon carcharias (Elasmobranchii, Lamniformes, Lamnidae), from the Mediterranean Spanish coast. Acta Ichthyologica et Piscatoria, 56, pp.27–31. doi:https://doi.org/10.3897/aiep.56.173786.
With 55% of its native habitat gone, the Cerrado is in crisis. Preserving this biodiversity hotspot demands immediate reform and the protection of Indigenous rights.
“In addition to surviving some of the poorest soils in intertropical Brazil, the vegetation of the Cerrado has achieved the ecological feat of withstanding wildfires, rising from its own ashes like a kind of phoenix among Brazil’s ecosystems. It cannot, however, withstand the violent technological artifices invented by so-called civilized men.”
Aziz Ab’Saber, 2003 (translated)
Often overshadowed by the Amazon, the Cerrado is the second-largest Ecodomain in South America. Despite covering 24% of the territory and sustaining major watersheds, it has historically been sidelined in global conservation dialogues.
Our detailed review recently published in Nature Conservation warns that this biodiversity hotspot is currently facing a massive, multi-faceted ecological crisis. Despite its significance, the region has seen more than 55% of its native vegetation converted, an area exceeding 1 million km², with the vast majority of this destruction occurring within the last five decades.
Land use and land cover (LULC) in the Cerrado Ecodomain in 1985 and 2023, revealing significant changes in the spatial structure of the territory. An intensification of human activities can be observed, with emphasis on agricultural expansion, which resulted in the significant replacement of native vegetation by alternative uses. This process represents an accelerated landscape transformation over the last four decades. These maps were made using the Cerrado shapefile developed by Cássio Cardoso Pereira, with LULC data available from MapBiomas (2024).
While recent data suggests a slight reduction in annual deforestation rates, the accumulated loss continues to climb, making the Cerrado the Ecodomain in Brazil with the greatest loss of native vegetation.
Annual clearing in the Cerrado (2001–2025) according to PRODES (INPE 2025). Bars represent the total area cleared each year (km²), with colors ranging from dark orange (highest values) to light orange (lowest values), indicating relative variation in intensity. Arrows indicate the percentage change compared to the previous year: increases (↑, red), decreases (↓, green), and stability (→, black, 0.0%). These data do not detect degradation, only complete removal of natural vegetation. Annual data refer to the so-called “reference year”, which runs from August of one year to July of the following year, based on satellite images with a resolution of 10 to 30 meters. The icons used in this figure are from Wikimedia licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Figure design: Cássio Cardoso Pereira.
This expansion is driven by a combination of agricultural and urban growth, mining, and land speculation, creating a landscape that is increasingly fragmented and ecologically compromised.
Inverted forest and hidden carbon
One of the things that make Cerrado truly unique is its “inverted forest“. Unlike tropical rainforests that store their biomass in high canopies, the Cerrado has achieved an ecological feat of survival by storing approximately 90% of its carbon belowground through massive, deep root systems. This underground network makes the Ecodomain a critical carbon sink and a primary regulator of water.
Schematic representation of the distribution of carbon stocks in the Cerrado, characterized as an “inverted forest” due to the predominance of biomass and carbon belowground. Estimates were obtained from Terra et al. (2023). Figure design: Walisson Kenedy-Siqueira.
However, misguided restoration efforts that focus solely on planting exotic trees in naturally open areas can further exacerbate this issue, highlighting the need for restoration strategies that prioritize ecological functionality and native seed banks over simple afforestation.
Ecosystem diversity and conservation challenges
However, it is not just the vast tropical savanna in Cerrado that makes up this inverted forest, but the complex and interdependent mosaic of grasslands, savannas, and forests, each with distinct structures, ecological processes, and vulnerabilities. Treating it as homogeneous invisibilizes both grassland and forest formations, complicating effective conservation policies.
For example, natural grasslands, especially in the montane Campos Rupestres, occupy limited areas, harbor high endemism, and face strong pressures from mining, biological invasions, and increased fire. Whilst savannas, although dominant in the area, have been widely converted into monocultures, exotic pastures, and forestry, compromising ecological integrity.
Main anthropogenic threats to the Cerrado resulting from land-use changes, ranked by impact on each ecosystem type (I–III: grassland, savanna, and forest). The ecosystems illustrated are according to Ribeiro and Walter (2008). For more details on each ecosystem. Figure design: Walisson Kenedy-Siqueira.
Even though some species are adapted to natural fire, many ecosystems, such as forests, the marshland formationsVeredas, and the montane Campos Rupestres, are highly vulnerable. Exotic species invasions and increased frequency and intensity of fires exacerbate ecological losses even without direct deforestation. We’ve found out that nearly all fires in the Cerrado are human-induced and occur outside natural regimes, causing cumulative degradation.
Threatened biodiversity and conservation gaps
Our research highlights a troubling pattern of ‘silent extinctions’ across the Cerrado. While this Ecodomain is home to thousands of unique plants and animals, we have identified a massive gap in how these species are monitored. Plants and invertebrates are the most threatened yet the least studied. This means species are vanishing before they can even be scientifically documented. Current policies are failing because they rely on incomplete data; we cannot protect what we have not yet cataloged. To prevent total collapse, we must expand our conservation criteria to protect not just individual species, but the complex ecological interactions that sustain the region’s water and soil.
Percentage distribution of threatened species among different biological groups in the Cerrado. The information was adapted from the IUCN Red List (2024), the Flora and Funga of Brazil portal (2024), the official national list of threatened species by MMA (2022), terrestrial vertebrate data from Vieira-Alencar et al. (2025), freshwater fish data from Lima and Ribeiro (2011), and invertebrate data from Embrapa (2023). Figure design: Walisson Kenedy-Siqueira.
Cerrado’s water crisis
The environmental crisis in the Cerrado is also a “silent water crisis” that threatens Brazil’s national security. The Ecodomain sustains the country’s main watersheds and major aquifers, yet this balance is being disrupted by irrigated agriculture, agrochemical contamination, and dam construction. Excessive surface and groundwater withdrawal is already leading to reduced river flows and the degradation of Veredas, which are essential for water regulation.
Paradoxically, the very sectors that drive this degradation, such as agribusiness and energy production, are the most dependent on these water resources, creating a cycle of increasing water insecurity. Protecting the Cerrado’s riparian zones and aquifers is no longer just an environmental concern but a prerequisite for the survival of the regional economy and climate resilience.
Disconnect between law and reality
The Cerrado is facing a dangerous disconnect between environmental law and ecological reality. Our research reveals that current protection is startlingly thin: while we cataloged 706 Conservation Units, they cover only 8% of the Ecodomain, with less than3% under strict protection.
To assist researchers and policymakers, we have compiled an unprecedented dataset of these units, including the often overlooked Private Natural Heritage Reserves (RPPNs) and crucial ecotones, available at: https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.61.168273.suppl1.
However, data alone isn’t enough. The Brazilian Forest Code, specifically the 20% Reserva Legal (RL) and the narrow 30-meter Áreas de Preservação Permanent (APPs) are ecologically insufficient. These leave vital formations like Veredas and Campos Rupestres as isolated, vulnerable fragments.
To prevent ecosystem collapse and secure Brazil’s water supply, we advocate for urgent reforms: increasing RL requirements to at least 35%, expanding protection zones to reflect biological reality, and enforcing strict traceability to decouple agricultural production from habitat loss.
Recognition and protection of Indigenous lands
Kayapó people from the state of Pará. Their lands are located in the Amazon, but include a Cerrado enclave, which is shown in the review. Photo credit to: Adriano Adriano Jerozolimski
Beyond legal designations, we emphasize that the future of the Cerrado depends on recognizing the rights of Indigenous peoples, whose traditional knowledge and sustainable land management have maintained the ecosystem’s balance for millennia.
For instance, recent laws such as the Marco Temporal and agribusiness proposals threaten to reduce their territories and accelerate biodiversity loss, making it urgent to protect and fully recognize these lands to conserve the Cerrado and its ecological resilience.
Mobilizing knowledge and adding value
Effective conservation requires recognizing the Cerrado as a biodiversity hotspot with dedicated legal instruments capable of protecting its full ecological heterogeneity.
Moving forward, the extractive logic of the past must be replaced with with regenerative systems, prioritizing conservation, restoration, and biodiversity-based economic alternatives, including agroforestry, payments for ecosystem services, fiscal incentives such as ICMS Ecológico. Ultimately, these measures will help promote conservation, social justice and sustainable certifications that recognize the Cerrado’s biodiversity as a core economic asset
Original publicaiton:
Pereira, C.C., Walisson Kenedy-Siqueira, Maia, L.R., da, V., Arantes-Garcia, L., Fernandes, S., França, G., Carvalho, G., Rodrigues, J., Salm, R. and Fearnside, P.M. (2026). The Cerrado crisis review: highlighting threats and providing future pathways to save Brazil’s biodiversity hotspot. Nature Conservation, 61, pp.29–70. doi: https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.61.168273
Recent study published in Frontiers of Biogeography shows how local microclimates can amplify and mitigate extreme temperatures associated with climate change
During my PhD, I spent three summers crawling through a beautiful calcareous grassland nature reserve in Bedfordshire, UK, looking for caterpillars amongst the grasses and wildflowers. Occasionally we would have extremely hot weather, and as I was crawling around in the chalky earth, I noticed how hot it was near the ground. I was carrying a thermocouple with me, and I noticed that from standing to crouching down to the ground, air temperature could increase by up to 10 or even 20°C.
This got me thinking – insects experience temperatures that are very different from what I was experiencing while walking around. A pleasantly warm day to me may feel very different to a small insect close to the ground. What is this micro-world like for insects?
Photo of Duke of Burgundy butterfly by Prof. Edgar C. Turner
I deployed a network of data loggers across the nature reserve to help me answer this question. I wanted to know what near ground temperatures were really like on hot days, cold days, and everything in between.
So, the loggers recorded microclimate temperatures for a year and half in total, and we managed to capture six heatwave events in that time. We were even lucky enough (or perhaps unlucky enough) to be recording when air temperatures broke 40°C in the UK for the very first time, the dreaded summer of 2022. This gave us a rare opportunity to see what the world might look like more regularly under climate change.
Now armed with real-world hourly temperature measurements at fine scales, we could glimpse the world that insects occupy. Temperatures were indeed hotter near the ground and rose steadily with increasing temperature these temperatures rose and rose with increasing air temperature. In fact, we found thousands of individual records of temperatures over 40°C, half of which occurred outside of heatwave events.
It turns out that insects are experiencing extreme temperatures more frequently than we previously anticipated, and not necessarily only during heatwaves.
One of the main goals of our project was to identify how we can maintain cool refugia within landscapes – microclimates that are cooler than ambient temperature (think of a cool, shady patch of grass under a tree on a hot sunny day).
Photo of Duke of Burgundy butterfly by Edgar C. Turner
I had hoped to be able to identify combinations of environmental characteristics, such as steep north-facing slopes with long grass, that were able to maintain refugia well below ambient temperature during heatwaves.
However, what we found was that during heatwaves, areas that we expected to stay cool would turn into heat traps. Surprisingly, what we thought would mitigate extreme temperatures would actually amplify them!
This was a trend across all types of habitats, with no part of the nature reserve consistently maintaining cool refugia during heatwaves. This is incredibly worrying! It means that escape from the heat during heatwaves for small and slow-moving animals will be extremely difficult.
Vulnerability to climate change may depend on where species live in the vertical plane. Species that can fly (such as the large skipper, top left) or live high up in tall vegetation (such as the red admiral caterpillar on stinging nettle, top right) may be buffered from extreme heat. However, species that live near the ground or in short vegetation (such as the glowworm, bottom left, or leaf beetle, bottom right) may be particularly exposed to amplified temperatures.
The nature reserve we were monitoring is a fragment of rare calcareous grassland nestled amongst agricultural land and urban areas. It has been actively managed to maintain high biodiversity, and this has been very successful. It contains many rare and interesting small animals, such as the Duke of Burgundy butterfly and glowworms. Certainly, it is a beautiful example of a biodiversity hotspot in the UK.
However, our results imply that exposed landscapes such as these grasslands are at particular risk under climate change, with little we can do to protect wildlife from extreme heat during heatwaves, especially for small ground-dwelling organisms.
Research paper:
Ashe-Jepson, E., Turner, E.C. and Bladon, A.J. (2025). Local microclimates can both amplify and mitigate extreme temperatures associated with climate change. Frontiers of Biogeography 18: https://doi.org/10.21425/fob.18.164843
Scientists compiled and summarized the largest dataset to date on the cladocerans of the Republic of Tyva—the result of almost thirty years of field work.
Guest blog post by Nadezhda Kirova, Valeria Kirova, Alexey Kotov and Dr. Petr Garibian
The functioning of freshwater ecosystems is impossible without cladocerans (water fleas), which play a key role in the food chains of most continental water bodies. Although the cladoceran fauna is relatively well-studied in the Palearctic as a whole, vast territories of Central Asia, including the Republic of Tyva, have until recently been only fragmentarily studied and required systematic survey.
Different zooplankton in a Petri dish. Photo by Dr.Petr Garibian
The first mentions of water bodies in Tyva date back to the 16th century, with the first data on zooplankton appearing in the early 20th century in the works of the Norwegian researcher Georg Ossian Sars (1903) and the Soviet scientist Vyacheslav Rylov (1923, 1930). Historical events of the 20th century significantly influenced the development of hydrobiological research in the region: after the republic became part of the USSR in 1944, the study of water bodies was actively conducted within the framework of ichthyological and fisheries tasks.
Starting from the 1960s, under the leadership of Tomsk scientists Alexey Gundrizer and later Victor Popkov, large-scale ichthyological and hydrobiological research was carried out in the region. During this period, zooplankton was studied primarily as a food source.
Cladocerans — the invisible foundation of freshwater life
Daphnia galeata is a small species of planktonic crustaceans. Photo taken by Dr.Petr Garibian
If you were to scoop up water from any lake, pond, or steppe salt marsh and examine it under a microscope, you would almost certainly see cladocerans among the first creatures—microscopic crustaceans, usually 0.2–6 mm in size, invisible to the naked eye, but playing a huge role in freshwater ecosystems.
What are they?
Cladocerans are small crustaceans with a characteristic rounded or oval body shape; in most species, the limbs are hidden behind paired valves or a carapace. Externally, they may resemble miniature droplets pulsating in the water. The most well-known representatives of cladocerans are from the genus Daphnia. When first discovered, they were called “pulex aquaticus” or “water flea,” a term still used in scientific publications.
What is their role in nature?
Ceriodaphnia reticulata, a common cladoceran species found in US lakes. This is a female carrying two (orange) eggs in her brood chamber. Photo by Florida Sea Grant under a CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 license
Cladocerans play a key role in the functioning of freshwater ecosystems. Primarily, they are a central link in food chains: continuously filtering water and consuming phytoplankton, bacteria, and organic particles, these tiny crustaceans regulate the intensity of algal blooms, maintain water transparency, and control algal numbers. Thanks to cladocerans, many processes in aquatic ecosystems remain balanced, and they themselves serve as a crucial food source for the fry of most freshwater fish and predatory insect larvae. Without them, many species simply could not survive their early stages of development.
Thus, cladocerans perform the function of ecosystem sanitizers. By filtering water, they cleanse it of fine organic debris and bacteria, acting as a natural “microbial vacuum” that maintains freshwater quality.
Finally, these crustaceans are very sensitive to changes in the aquatic environment. Some cladocerans quickly react to changes in salinity, the presence of heavy metals, toxic substances, and other types of pollution. Thanks to this sensitivity, cladocerans are widely used in water quality biotesting, making them a valuable tool for environmental monitoring.
How do they survive?
Bosmina longirostris, а common species of cladoceran zooplankton found in US lakes. Photo by Florida Sea Grant under a CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 license
Cladocerans have an amazing life cycle. Under favorable conditions, they reproduce by parthenogenesis, without the participation of males—females simply clone themselves. This allows them to instantly colonize temporary water bodies after rains or snowmelt.
When “hard times” come—with the onset of cooling, shorter daylight hours, or the drying up of a water body—cladocerans produce resting eggs. These eggs are covered with a strong shell, can withstand drying, frost, and persist in bottom sediments for decades. Sometimes this “cladoceran archive” in the silt is used to study past climatic epochs—like a natural flash drive.
Where do they live?
Almost everywhere, on all continents including Antarctica. They can be found in diverse continental water bodies: rivers, lakes, swamps, ditches, puddles, and other temporary pools. There are even unique species living in leaf axils, tree hollows, damp moss, groundwater, and caves.
The cladocerans of Central Asia are very diverse, where fresh, slightly saline, and saline water bodies are in close proximity—each with its own unique crustaceans.
Why are they important for science?
Daphnia magna is a species of Daphnia (a cladoceran freshwater water flea). Photo: Per Harald Olsen/NTNU. Credit: NTNU, Faculty of Natural Sciences under a CC BY 2.0 license
Cladocerans are an ideal model for ecologists:
They reproduce quickly.
They are easily cultivated.
They instantly react to environmental changes.
They survive climatic changes.
They form the basis of freshwater communities.
Specimens found in permafrost allow scientists to literally “reconstruct zooplankton communities of the past,” comparing populations from different periods, researching evolution in real time, and tracing climate change processes.
Tyva
The Republic of Tyva is one of the most contrasting and unusual regions of Eurasia. Within a relatively small area, almost all of the Earth’s natural zones are found—from semi-deserts and dry steppes to alpine meadows and high-mountain tundras.
Republic of Tyva on the map
The climate in the region is sharply continental, with cold winters, hot summers, large daily temperature fluctuations (up to 30°C), and extremely low precipitation, especially in the steppe basins. The climate in the mountains is milder, with more precipitation, warmer winters, and cooler summers than in the basins. The highest peaks have eternal snow. The highest mountain, Mongun-Taiga, is 3976 meters above sea level. This diversity of natural and climatic conditions creates a wide ecological spectrum.
The landscape mosaic of Tyva is impressive—steppe plains with sand massifs, taiga slopes, high-mountain plateaus, swampy areas, and numerous lakes coexist here. There are about two thousand lakes in Tyva, from large ones like Chagytai and Azas to small brackish and freshwater lakes.
The Ubsunur Basin stands out among the natural landscapes—a unique transboundary natural complex included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Here, in a small area, one can find desert, steppe, tundra, and alpine meadows, as well as many lakes with varying degrees of mineralization—from almost fresh to hyperhaline.
This combination of contrasting climatic zones, altitudinal gradients, types of water bodies, and salinity levels makes Tuva a natural laboratory for studying aquatic biota.
Dataset
In the course of the research, scientists compiled and summarized the largest dataset to date on the cladocerans of the Republic of Tyva—the result of almost thirty years of field work in the region (1993–2022). A total of 902 water bodies of various types were surveyed: permanent and temporary, differing in depth, altitude, and salinity.
Taiga
Mongun-Taiga is the highest mountain in Tyva
It is important to note that only a few of the lakes located in the basins can be reached by a comfortable road. Most of the water bodies are situated in the mountains, in hard-to-reach areas with difficult mountain roads. The work was incredibly labor-intensive but also exhilarating: our cars broke down high in the mountains far from any settlements, we experienced earthquakes, we had to spend nights near ancient burial mounds, wolves walked near our camp, and marals would occasionally approach us. We even once had to run quickly high in the mountains to escape a thundercloud whose lightning was striking the ground.
The proceess of sampling from reservoirs
The proceess of sampling from reservoirs
The proceess of sampling from reservoirs
Expedition camp
The group of scientists on one of the expeditions: Professor Artem Sinev (Lomonosov Moscow State University, Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences), Natalia Sheveleva (Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences), Nadezhda Kirova (Tuvinian Institute for Exploration of Natural Resources of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences)
The process of sampling from reservoirs
The process of sampling from reservoirs
On one occasion, we fell into a glacial quickstream. These formations, which occur near high-mountain lakes due to the melting of relict ice, suck you into the depths like quicksand, and are incredibly difficult to escape! So this dataset is inextricably linked with a whole series of adventures.
The final dataset, published in Darwin Core Archive format on GBIF, includes 3,599 occurrence records and 76 species of cladocerans. It is noteworthy that not a single invasive species was found in Tyva, although such finds are not uncommon in studies of cladocerans in other regions.
Stopping due to a broken car
Roads high in the mountains
Roads high in the mountains
Stopping due to a broken car
The thunderstorm we were running from
The obtained materials significantly expand the understanding of the composition and spatial distribution of cladocerans in Tyva, which was previously poorly studied from a faunistic perspective.
Nadezda Kirova and Toby
A special mention must be made of the constant members of our expedition team — Toby the dog, who took part in the annual field trips from 2011 onward, growing from a playful puppy into a wise “scientist dog,” and Karkusha the raven, who joined us in 2016 after we found him as a chick with broken legs and decided to keep him. Without exaggeration, both became an integral part of the long-term history of our fieldwork and made their own contribution.
Toby passed away in November 2025, shortly after our research paper was published, at the age of fourteen. It would not be an overstatement to say that he truly devoted his life to these studies, accompanying us year after year and becoming a symbol of the expedition itself.
Research article:
Kirova N, Kirova V, Kotov A (2025) Diversity of the cladocerans (Crustacea, Branchiopoda) in the Republic of Tyva, Russian Federation. Biodiversity Data Journal 13: e163656. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.13.e163656
This is the first policy brief by the Horizon Europe project PollinERA, whose aim is to improve pesticide risk assessments, in order to protect wild pollinators across the Europe Union.
The 11-member PollinERA project consortium, brought together to reverse pollinator population declines and reduce the harmful impacts of pesticides, has released its first policy brief.
This marks an important stepping stone for the project, bringing PollinERA’s scientific insights directly into the policy space in a format designed to support decision-making.
It has been acknowledged that the current approach works in isolation, overlooks cumulative impacts and bases decisions solely on binary “safe/unsafe” categories.
What the PollinERA-derived policy brief suggests is a systems-first, tools-second approach that can deliver faster, cheaper and effective decision-making by prioritising simulation and systems understanding before developing regulatory tools for Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA).
The brief is authored by project coordinator Christopher John Topping, Noa Simon Delso, James Henty Williams and Johan Axelman. Together, the team used their expertise in pollinator research and environmental policy to present PollinERA findings in an accessible, practical and relevant way, dedicated for those who shape policy at European and national levels.
To ensure transparency and provide a strong scientific foundation, the policy brief is supported by a technical evidence report, also made openly available.
The policy brief, technical supportive documents, as well as key scientific resources and publications are conveniently and publicly accessible in the PollinERA’s project collection, hosted in the open-science scholarly journal Research Ideas and Outcomes (RIO). Being ‘a living’ space, the collection will be further enriched as new valuable outputs are generated over the course of the project.
The policy brief marks the beginning of the PollinERA Policy series: a collection of policy briefs that will be released throughout the project.
Each brief will focus on a different aspect of pollinator protection or pesticide risk assessment, helping to build a coherent and comprehensive set of policy-facing outputs.
Titled “Otters as Bioindicators of Estuarine Health: Innovations in Monitoring and Management from Tropical Coastal Brazil,” the collection celebrates nearly four decades of pioneering otter conservation and estuarine stewardship in Brazil, while advancing global knowledge on sustainable coastal ecosystem management.
Since 1986, Projeto Lontra has stood at the forefront of tropical otter conservation, ecological monitoring, and community engagement. Over the years, its research has provided unprecedented insights into the health of estuarine and coastal ecosystems—making otters not only charismatic species of interest, but powerful sentinels of environmental change.
“2026 will mark the 40th anniversary of Projeto Lontra. This partnership represents a rare convergence of long-term field knowledge, cutting-edge methodology, and global outreach—precisely the kind of collaboration needed to scale impact in applied estuarine conservation.”
From hydrodynamic assessments and habitat connectivity studies to long-term behavioral monitoring, Projeto Lontra has generated one of the most extensive otter-focused datasets in the Western Atlantic.
EMT Editor-in-Chief Dr. Soufiane Haddout highlights the significance of this collaborative milestone:
“Otters aren’t just icons of biodiversity—they’re active barometers of estuarine resilience. Partnering with Instituto Ekko Brasil allows us to amplify voices from the Global South, transforming local stewardship into global action. This is more than a collection; it’s a call to reimagine how we protect our coasts through otter-inspired innovation.”
The new collection directly supports EMT’s mission to strengthen the exchange of applied research, technology, and management strategies that support the long-term sustainability of estuarine ecosystems worldwide.
All contributions to the Topical Collection come from the Projeto Lontra team and invited collaborators who have worked closely with the project over the years. The resulting series of articles will showcase the unparalleled long-term dataset built since 1986 and demonstrate how otters serve as powerful sentinels of estuarine and coastal health.
Guest Editors
Projeto Lontra – Instituto Ekko Brasil
Dr Oldemar Carvalho Junior– Coordinator, Projeto Lontra & Institutional Director, Instituto Ekko Brasil, Florianópolis, Brazil
Ms Alessandra Bez Birolo – Coordinator of Social Mobilization and Public Policies, Founding Partner, Instituto Ekko Brasil; Environmental Education Coordinator, Projeto Lontra, Brazil
Mr Marcelo Tosatti – President, Instituto Ekko Brasil; Field Researcher (20+ years), Projeto Lontra, Brazil
EMT Editorial Board
Dr Soufiane Haddout – Editor-in-Chief, Estuarine Management and Technologies, Ibn Tofail University, Morocco
Dr P.R. Jayachandran – King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Saudi Arabia
The partnership between EMT and Projeto Lontra embodies a powerful message: long-term conservation succeeds when knowledge, people, and technology work together.
By elevating nearly 40 years of Brazilian conservation leadership to global research audiences, this Topical Collection aims to inspire new partnerships, operational tools, and policy actions that safeguard estuarine ecosystems for future generations.
Guest blog post from the University of Copenhagen. Read their press release here.
An international team of researchers have identified three new species of enchanting, pustular, tree-dwelling toads from Africa. Their solution for having offspring away from water? Skipping the tadpole phase altogether, and giving birth to live toadlets. The study is published in the open-access scientific journal Vertebrate Zoology.
One of the newly described toad species, Nectophrynoides luhomeroensis. Photo credit: John Lyarkurwa
Most textbooks will tell you only one story of frog reproduction: Eggs to tadpoles to froglets to adults. But for three newly discovered species found in Tanzania this is not the case. The three new species of frogs belong to an unusual group of African toads in the genus Nectophrynoides — commonly called “tree toads.”
Instead of laying eggs that hatch into tadpoles, the female tree toads carry their offspring inside their bodies and give birth to fully formed, tiny toads. This makes them among the very few amphibians in the world capable of internal fertilization and true live birth.
“It’s common knowledge that frogs grow from tadpoles—it’s one of the classic metamorphosis paradigms in biology. But the nearly 8000 frog species actually have a wide variety of reproductive modes, many of which don’t closely resemble that famous story” says Assoc. Prof. Mark D. Scherz, Curator for Herpetology at the Natural History Museum Denmark, a coauthor on the study.
Like its relatives, Nectophrynoides luhomeroensis has large skin glands all over its body. Photo credit: Michele Menegon.
Only a handful of frog species from South America and southeast Asia have developed similar strategies making these toads a rare case in the animal kingdom.
“Live-bearing is exceptionally rare among frogs and toads, practiced by less than 1% of frogs species, making these new species exceptionally interesting,” says H. Christoph Liedtke a co-author from the Spanish National Research Council, who has specialized in the evolution of amphibian reproductive modes.
120-year-old frog DNA
Back in 1905, a German researcher, Gustav Tornier, presented to the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin, the discovery of a toad from Tanzania that, astonishingly, gives birth to live young. At the time, it was the only known species of frog in the world to do so.
One of the newly described toad species, Nectophrynoides uhehe. Photo credit: Michele Menegon.
The frogs originally found by Tornier are today housed at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, and the research team were able to secure DNA from the original frogs using methods collectively known as ‘museomics’.
“Some of these specimens were collected over 120 years ago. Our museomics work was able to reveal exactly which populations those old specimens belonged to, giving us a lot more confidence for future work on these toads,” says Dr Alice Petzold of the University of Potsdam, who carried out the museomics portion of the study.
“Phylogenetic work from a few years ago had already let us know there was previously unrecognised diversity among these toads. But by travelling to different natural history museums and examining hundreds of preserved toads, I was able to get a better idea of their morphological diversity, so we could describe these new species,” says Christian Thrane from University of Copenhagen and first author on the study.
One of the newly described toad species, Nectophrynoides uhehe. Photo credit: Michele Menegon.
Protecting endangered species
Beyond its evolutionary interest, the discovery could have important implications for conservation. Many of these live-bearing toads inhabit small, fragmented habitats and are under threat from deforestation, mining, and climate change.
The new species are from the Eastern Arc Mountains (EAM) of Tanzania, an imperiled biodiversity hotspot famed for the many species that are found nowhere else on Earth. These mountains that rise from the plains are cloaked in lush forests, but Dr Michele Menegon, another coauthor on the study who works for a conservation organisation whose work focuses on forest protection, notes how highly fragmented these habitats are and that this is impacting the biodiversity, including the toads that dwell there.
Nectophrynoides species are often found near rainforest streams in the Eastern Arc mountains of Tanzania. Photo credit: Michele Menegon.
His colleague from the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzia raises the same concern.
“The forests where these toads are known to occur are disappearing quickly,” says John V. Lyakurwa, a researcher from the University of Dar es Salaam, who has been studying amphibians in the EAM, including these toads, and a coauthor on the study.
Most of the tree toads are already on the brink of extinction, with one species in this genus, Nectophrynoides asperginis, already extinct in the wild, and another Nectophrynoides poyntoni not observed since its discovery in 2003. The future of these beautiful toads is very uncertain.
Original source
Thrane C, Lyakurwa JV, Liedtke HC, Menegon M, Petzold A, Loader SP, Scherz MD (2025) Museomics and integrative taxonomy reveal three new species of glandular viviparous tree toads (Nectophrynoides) in Tanzania’s Eastern Arc Mountains (Anura: Bufonidae). Vertebrate Zoology 75: 459-485. https://doi.org/10.3897/vz.75.e167008
