Paulo De Marco Júnior

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• D.Sc.
• Professor (Full) at Federal University of Goiás

Community assembly theory is founded on the premise that the relative importance of local environmental processes and dispersal shapes the compositional structure of metacommunities. The species sorting model predicts that assemblages are dominated by the environmental filtering of species that are readily able to disperse to suitable sites. We pro...

The increasing use of species distribution modeling (SDM) has raised new concerns regarding the inaccuracies, misunderstanding, and misuses of this important tool. One of those possible pitfalls − collinearity among environmental predictors − is assumed as an important source of model uncertainty, although it has not been subjected to a detailed ev...

Ecological niche models (ENMs) is a popular method in ecology, mostly due to its broad applicability and the fact that required data is simple and easily accessible from digital databases. Nevertheless, there is an underlying methodological complexity, often overlooked by many scientists that rely on ENMs to achieve other objectives. We present her...

Areas set aside for conservation within private lands may be key to enhancing biodiversity-friendly landscapes. This conservation strategy should be especially effective in highly threatened regions that are poorly protected by public lands, such as the Brazilian Cerrado. Brazil’s Native Vegetation Protection Law has included set-aside areas within...

Source–sink dynamics investigates species dispersal, mainly at the landscape scale, providing outcomes for conservation problem-solving. Designing conservation plans requires accurately identifying a source or a sink habitat within the landscape. However, this practical use demands a theoretical background and a clear definition of source and sink...

Ecological restoration aims to recover the structure, biodiversity, and function of degraded ecosystems. However, open ecosystems have been largely overlooked in restoration, and the extent of theory-based restoration is unclear. We systematically review papers on open ecosystems restoration from 2011 to 2021, examining publication trends with data...

Knowing the ecological aspects and social dynamics of a natural population is important to assess how animals respond to the impacts of human activities in their habitats, which aids in the identification of conservation strategies. The Inia araguaiaensis, locally known as the Araguaian boto, is a poorly known species, categorized as vulnerable to...

Indigenous lands play a leading role in conserving biodiversity and mitigating climate change, which is fundamental for Brazil and the world. However, the Marco Temporal law n° 14.701/23 argues that Brazilian indigenous peoples only have the right to demarcate lands that were in their possession or disputed at the time of the promulgation of the 19...

Despite acoustic signals playing a fundamental role on animal behavior and reproduction, our understanding of the mechanisms driving their evolution is still scarce. Due to the high cost of signaling, several adaptive bioacoustics hypotheses have been proposed to explain call design. While Acoustic Adaptation Hypothesis (AAH) postulates the habitat...

The Amazon rainforest has approximately 23% of its sampled area dedicated to bats, making it one of the least sampled and most diverse regions for bats in Brazil. The lack of sampling results in a lack of knowledge regarding the accurate geographical distribution of bat species. This lack is referred to as the Wallacean shortfall, which should be a...

Aim: The Amazon rainforest has approximately 23% of its sampled area dedicated to bats, making it one of the least sampled and most diverse regions for bats in Brazil. The lack of sampling results in a lack of knowledge regarding the accurate geographical distribution of bat species. This lack is referred to as the Wallacean shortfall, which should...

Aim Insects are one of the least studied taxa, with most species lacking basic ecological and biogeographical information. This problem is particularly acute in the tropics, where low sampling effort hampers accurate estimates of species richness at scale and potentially confounds efforts to identify the drivers of biogeographical gradients. Here,...

Freshwater aquatic ecosystems are vulnerable to human activities within their surroundings, presenting a concerning scenario for aquatic organisms and human subsistence. Therefore, understanding the occurrence of pesticide contamination is a necessary condition to safeguard aquatic biodiversity and human health. We analysed the pesticide residues i...

Most assessments of the conservation status of Brazilian turtles use the IUCN geographic range criteria performed by the Minimum Convex Polygon (MCP). This technique often leads to over- or under-estimating the geographic distribution of rare, vulnerable, or endangered species. We aimed to demonstrate that using Species Distribution Models (SDM) on...

Environmental characteristics, spatial structures, and landscape features are ecological factors that drive beta diversity in stream communities, but the effects of these factors, considering multiple spatial scales on beta diversity in aquatic communities, still remain a goal of community ecology. Using the distance-based redundancy analysis (db-R...

Species distribution and ecological niche models (hereafter SDMs) are popular tools with broad applications in ecology, biodiversity conservation, and environmental science. Many SDM applications require projecting models in environmental conditions non-analog to those used for model training (extrapolation), giving predictions that may be statisti...

Odonata species live through their immature development in aquatic habitats, where the eggs are adapted to survive the initial stages. The survival of the eggs is linked to the layers that make up the eggshell. These layers are common to all odonate species, but show variations among them, depending on the oviposition method. For example, endophyti...

The role of information is critical in how societies handle complex issues, such as environmental policies. However, the global prevalence of low-quality sources has a significant impact on societal perception. Within this scenario, Brazil may represent a useful model case with recent policy changes aiming to reduce government control on environmen...

Aim Mining is increasingly pressuring areas of critical importance for biodiversity conservation, such as the Brazilian Amazon. Biodiversity data are limited in the tropics, restricting the scope for risks to be appropriately estimated before mineral licensing decisions are made. As the distributions and range sizes of other taxa differ markedly fr...

Cerrado is considered one of the world's most threatened and floristically diverse tropical savannas. Distribution of the Cerrado flora comprises three countries: Bolivia, Brazil, and Paraguay; consequently, opportunities to conserve it require a transboundary effort. We aimed to (i) explore the relationship between a representative portion of Cerr...

The conversion of natural areas for the advancement of economic activities such as agriculture, mining, livestock, and energy production are the main challenges for biodiversity conservation in Brazil. The establishment and expansion of protected areas (PA) are the cheapest way to ensure biodiversity protection and the maintenance of ecosystem serv...

Spix’s Macaw Cyanopsitta spixii is one of the most endangered Neotropical Psittacidae species. Extinct in the wild in the year 2000, in June 2022 the first cohort of C. spixii was reintroduced to its original habitat. For a successful reintroduction of the species, it is necessary to examine the viability of the population against natural and exter...

The conversion of forests into open areas has large effects on the diversity and structure of native communities. The intensity of these effects may vary between regions, depending on the existence of native species adapted to open habitats in the regional pool or the time since habitat change. We assess the differences in species richness and func...

Environmental changes are increasingly frequent, resulting in adverse impacts on biodiversity. These effects are more harmful when superimposed on areas of high biodiversity such as the Amazon region, in which the gaps in knowledge of the number of existing species and how they are distributed. This article reviews the known geographical distributi...

Knowledge of the feeding habits of primate species is important for an understanding of their natural history and ecological interactions between their groups, and their interactions with their environments. Capuchin monkeys (Sapajus spp.) present significant diet flexibility and are a good model for investigating diet diversity between species. We...

Diversity gradients are observed for various groups of organisms. For fishes in streams, the water-energy, productivity, and temporal heterogeneity hypotheses can explain richness patterns. The relationship between species diversity and the variables that represent these hypotheses is generally linear and stationary, that is, the effect of each of...

This research-level text documents the latest advances in odonate biology and relates these to a broader ecological and evolutionary research agenda. Despite being one of the smallest insect orders, dragonflies offer a number of advantages for both laboratory and field studies. In fact, they continue to make a crucial contribution to the advancemen...

Animals can eavesdrop on other competitors during territorial defense disputes to better choose rivals weaker than themselves and increase the chances of monopolizing resources. In dragonflies, males often compete for access to water bodies, which attract sexually receptive females to mate and lay eggs. During the breeding season, satellite males c...

Species distribution models (SDMs) are a key tool for biogeography and climate change research, although current approaches have some significant drawbacks. The use of species occurrence constrains predictions of correlative models, while there is a general lack of eco‐physiological data to develop mechanistic models. Passive acoustic monitoring is...

Environmental management is one of the most important activities in ecological conservation at present. Faced with various socioeconomic impacts (e.g., urbanization, agriculture, and logging), practical and effective ways to analyze and determine how biodiversity is affected by these anthropogenic activities are essential. Utilizing niche theory he...

Recently, much effort has been expended to improve Species Distribution Models (SDMs), particularly for use in systematic conservation planning, as they affect the arrangement and effectiveness of spatial prioritization. Protocol definition to create SMDs is a real and complex problem faced to protect threatened environments in large megadiverse ar...

Protected areas (PAs) are one of the main strategies to protect biodiversity and its ecosystem services globally. Plants are a critical component of biodiversity, playing a key role in almost every aspect of life, and Fabaceae is the third most diverse plant family worldwide with many useful species. We evaluated the diversity of uses of Fabaceae,...

One of the major challenges of ecologists and biogeographers is to understand how species are globally distributed. Two of the most well-studied large-scale patterns in species distributions are the Rapoport’s rule and the Latitudinal Diversity Gradient (LDG). We aimed to address whether Neotropical odonates follow the Rapoport’s rule and if there...

The Species-Sorting concept, one of the models developed to explain patterns in metacommunity structure, suggests that relationships between biological communities and environmental conditions is the basic means of the species selection processes. A second concept is Neutral Theory, and the idea of neutral dynamics underpinning metacommunity struct...

Hypancistrus zebra is an endemic fish species from the Middle Xingu River and recently included in the Critically Endangered (CR) category in the Red Book List of Endangered Brazilian Fauna that follows IUCN criteria. Given these impacts and the lack of information about the species, it is difficult to assume the viability of natural populations. T...

The spatial distribution of Neotropical birds at local scales is often associated with plant successional stages and unique microhabitats such as bamboo stands and treefall gaps. Only 15% of the Atlantic Forest remains, yet this habitat is home to more than 200 endemic birds. Understanding the distribution of bird species within the Atlantic Forest...

The Tocantins-Araguaia Basin is one of the largest river systems in South America, located entirely within Brazilian territory. In the last decades, capital-concentrating activities such as agribusiness, mining, and hydropower promoted extensive changes in land cover, hydrology, and environmental conditions. These changes are jeopardizing the basin...

The high diversity of fish species found in Brazilian streams has attracted scientific interest in recent years. However, it is not clear how studies have addressed biodiversity knowledge shortfalls. We conducted a scientometric analysis of stream fish studies in Brazil to identify trends and gaps in how objectives, spatial coverage, and biodiversi...

Invasive exotic plants may compromise the survival, growth, and reproduction of native species and are among the leading causes of worldwide biodiversity losses. Climate changes—which will affect species distribution—may even amplify the problems caused by invasive species. Here, we used ecological niche models to evaluate the current and future di...

The ongoing encroachment of agricultural activities into natural areas is a growing problem for the ecological condition of streams. Stream ecological condition is best measured using both biotic and abiotic parameters that reflect different channel, riparian zone and catchment aspects. Multiple physical-chemical measures of water quality have long...

• Despite the current rates of deforestation and the expected climatic changes, protecting species in their natural habitats is still the simplest, cheapest, and most effective way of safeguarding biodiversity. Here, the network of protected areas in the Brazilian Amazon was evaluated to assess its effectiveness in safeguarding species of Odonata....

Odonata can be sampled following different types of protocols. In Brazil, the most used protocol is the scanning in fixed areas method, where a 100-meter transect is delimited in one of the stream margins, subdivided into 20 segments measuring 5 meters. Despite being universally used, the methodological efficiency or limitations of this protocol fo...

We evaluated the vulnerability of nesting sites (sandbanks) available to Podocnemis expansa, P. unifilis and P. sextuberculata to human threats and the coverage of these areas by a public policy created to conserve turtles. Species distribution models were used to identify potential nesting areas in the Brazilian Amazon, where sandbanks were mapped...

The Neotropics harbour the greatest diversity of freshwater fish on Earth. Despite recent advances in characterizing the fish fauna, the total number of species, distri-butional range, evolution and ecological traits remain uncertain. Thus, we quantify shortfalls in the knowledge of taxonomy (Linnean shortfall), geographic distribution (Wallacean s...

Aim Nearly 40 different hypotheses have been put forward to explain the latitudinal diversity gradient, implying that geographical variations of biodiversity may be the result of a complex array of factors affecting organisms in different ways. Our main goal was to identify the most important drivers of local dung beetle species richness in the Neo...

Species distribution models (SDM) are increasingly used in conservation planning to identify priority areas for the establishment of protected areas. Nevertheless, the quality of SDM varies widely and may compromise the effectiveness of protected areas. Here we reviewed whether SDM overprediction is considered in spatial conservation prioritization...

Insects are reportedly experiencing widespread declines, but we generally have sparse data on their abundance. Correcting this shortfall will take more effort than professional entomologists alone can manage. Volunteer nature enthusiasts can greatly help to monitor the abundance of dragonflies and damselflies (Odonata), iconic freshwater sentinels...

The identification of the mechanisms underlying patterns of species co‐occurrence is a way to identify which process(es) (niche, neutral, or both) structure metacommunities. The current paper had the goal of identifying patterns of co‐occurrence in Neotropical stream fish and determining which processes structure the fish metacommunity, and identif...

Wildlife trade is considered one of the most significant pathways for the spread of exotic species, as it is present worldwide and crosses abiotic and biotic barriers. In this sense, identifying potential invaders before they are introduced and analyzing the ecological implications of possible escapes of captive species to the wild is an important...

Brazilian indigenous lands prevent the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest while protecting the land rights of indigenous peoples. However, they are at risk because they overlap with large areas of registered interest for mining. Indigenous lands have been in the spotlight of the pro-development wing of the parliament for decades, and the curren...

Agricultural expansion as a main human activity has affected pollinator's habitat, causing spatial distribution changes. Meanwhile, pollinators still provide pollination service to improve crop production. However, their spatial response is unclear because of environmental changes. This study sought to estimate spatial distribution of crop producti...

The Species Sorting concept, one of the models developed to explain patterns in metacommunity structure, suggests that relationships between biological communities and environmental conditions is the basic means of the species selection processes. A second concept is neutral theory, and the idea of neutral dynamics underpinning metacommunity struct...

The increase of free and open online biodiversity databases is of paramount importance for current research in ecology and evolution. However, little attention is paid to using updated taxonomy in these “biodiversity big data” repositories and the quality of their taxonomic information is often questioned. Here we assess how reliable is the current...

Species vulnerability is defined based on their exposition, sensitivity and adaptive capacity to a given impact. Considering limitations to estimate the sensitivity component, we developed a framework integrating the knowledge on ecological niche models and extinction thresholds, generating species sensitivity scenarios at the landscape scale. Our...

Although most species distribution modeling (SDMs) are constructed at the species level, an appreciation of evolutionary processes has led to modeling above this level. In view of the difficulty in estimating the impacts of human actions on rare or deficient data species, we proposed a new approach to vulnerability assessment based on concepts alre...

Aquatic systems have been degraded by environmental changes aimed at increasing the productivity of farmland and ranches. These changes affect aquatic assemblages at both local and regional scales. The hypothesis of this study is that in-stream environmental conditions are more important determinants of species richness and composition of Gerromorp...

Context Dispersal plays a key role in linking populations, habitat (re)-colonization, and species range expansion. As fragmentation and habitat loss are ubiquitous threats and can disrupt dispersal, landscape connectivity modeling has become a valuable tool in conservation planning. Objectives We provide an overview of how current connectivity mod...

The accurate anticipation of potential biological invasions is a crucial step toward the control of invasive species. The method used most commonly to identify areas suitable for biological invasion is the construction of ecological niche models (ENMs), although the potential accuracy of this approach may be grossly overestimated. In the present st...

Although tropical forest fires are naturally rare, they have become more frequent and intense in response to recent changes in land use and climate. This shift in fire regime may drive widespread forest degradation in Amazonia, with important consequences not only for species richness but also for functional and phylogenetic diversity. Here, we tes...

In order to conserve species exploited by trafficking, governmental actions should be directed to source areas, aiming to reduce or eliminate illegal and indiscriminate trapping. However, few studies have diagnosed and prioritized the most relevant drivers of the illegal capture of wild animals. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the main drivers...

Regardless of the economic, social and environmental impacts caused by wild animal trafficking worldwide, the suitable destination of seized specimens is one of the main challenges faced by environmental managers and authorities. In Brazil, returning seized animals to the wild has been the most frequent path in population restoration programs, and...

Background: We identified and classified damselfly (Zygoptera) and dragonfly (Anisoptera) metacommunities in Brazilian Amazonia, relating species distribution patterns to known biological gradients and biogeographical history. We expected a random distribution of both Zygoptera and Anisoptera within interfluves. At the Amazonian scale, we expected...

Traditional conservation techniques for mapping highly biodiverse areas assume there to be satisfactory knowledge about the geographic distribution of biodiversity. There are, however, large gaps in biological sampling and hence knowledge shortfalls. This problem is even more pronounced in the tropics. Indeed, the use of only a few taxonomic groups...

Aim The anthropogenic climate change and land use change are considered two of the main factors that are altering biodiversity at the global scale. An evaluation that combined both factors can be relevant to detect which species could be the most vulnerable and reveal the regions of highest stability or susceptibility to biodiversity. We aimed to:...

The use of biodiversity surrogates is often suggested to increase the cost-effectiveness of biomonitoring programs, as this demands less time and taxonomic expertise. In addition, the detection of multi-taxon associations is a first step toward a better understanding of how organisms interact with each other. Such a multi-taxon association is terme...

The presence of riparian vegetation provides microclimatic regulation of stream conditions [e.g. luminosity (lux), air temperature (°C) and relative humidity (%)], which varies naturally throughout the day. These variables explain the diurnal behaviour patterns of ectotherms such as Odonata in natural areas. However, human land uses (e.g. pastures)...

Context The umbrella approach applied to landscape connectivity is based on the principle that the conservation or restoration of the dispersal habitats for some species also can facilitate the movement of others. Species traits alone do not seem to be enough to identify good connectivity umbrella species, showing the need to investigate the influe...

• Large Amazonian rivers may act as dispersal barriers for animals with low dispersal abilities, limiting their distribution to certain interfluves. Consequently, the distribution of these taxa would be less affected by macroclimatic gradients. Conversely, high‐dispersal taxa would be less constrained by large rivers and may track suitable climates...

Emergence substrate and sunlight penetration inherently trade off in patchy vegetation. Given the importance of solar radiation at emergence, we expected greater sunlight availability in sparse vegetation to advance emergence timing and reduce the average height of emergence fixation. We used outdoor mesocosms stocked with varying cattail (Typha) d...

Several hypotheses are used to explain species richness patterns. Some of them (e.g. species-area, species-energy, environment-energy, water-energy, terrestrial primary productivity, environmental spatial heterogeneity, and climatic heterogeneity) are known to explain species richness patterns of terrestrial organisms, especially when they are comb...

The eleven spatial filters selected to control the spatial autocorrelation of fish species richness in the streams. All the spatial filters are related to positive autocorrelation. The squares are positioned over the streams assessed. The highest values are black squares and the smallest values white squares. (TIF)

Scatter plots between the estimated fish species richness in streams and the difference between the observed and estimated richness for: (a) all the streams assessed; (b) Southeast Atlantic Basin; (c) Paraná Basin; (d) East Atlantic Basin; (e) Araguaia-Tocantins Basin; (f) Amazon Basin; (g) São Francisco Basin; and (h) North/Northwest Atlantic Basi...

Distribution of the variables used for testing the hypotheses. (TIF)

Bibliographical references and number of streams used in the analyses. (XLSX)

Geographic coordinates (decimal degrees) of the streams and variables included in the article. The name and unit of variables are indicating on the Table 1. (XLSX)

To achieve sustainable forest management, forests scientists and managers require ecological data such as tree size, growth rate, wood density, species abundance and forest structure. Lack of specific knowledge on these features may compromise the sustainable use of natural resources. Considering tree species, wood density may be considered as the...

Basic parameters used to model virtual species response to original climatic variables. Identifier, geographic position of the simulated centroid and the centroid in the environmental space defined by original bioclim variables (b1: annual mean temperature; b2: mean diurnal range; b3: isothermality; b4: temperature seasonality; b5: max temperature...