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      Mapping Portuguese Natura 2000 sites in risk of biodiversity change caused by atmospheric nitrogen pollution

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          Abstract

          In this paper, we assess and map the risk that atmospheric nitrogen (atN) pollution poses to biodiversity in Natura 2000 sites in mainland Portugal. We first review the ecological impacts of atN pollution on terrestrial ecosystems, focusing on the biodiversity of Natura 2000 sites. These nature protection sites, especially those located within the Mediterranean Basin, are under-characterized regarding the risk posed by atN pollution. We focus on ammonia (NH 3) because this N form is mostly associated with agriculture, which co-occurs at or in the immediate vicinity of most areas of conservation interest in Portugal. We produce a risk map integrating NH 3 emissions and the susceptibility of Natura 2000 sites to atN pollution, ranking habitat sensitivity to atN pollution using expert knowledge from a panel of Portuguese ecological and habitat experts. Peats, mires, bogs, and similar acidic and oligotrophic habitats within Natura 2000 sites (most located in the northern mountains) were assessed to have the highest relative risk of biodiversity change due to atN pollution, whereas Natura 2000 sites in the Atlantic and Mediterranean climate zone (coastal, tidal, and scrubland habitats) were deemed the least sensitive. Overall, results allowed us to rank all Natura 2000 sites in mainland Portugal in order of evaluated risk posed by atN pollution. The approach is of great relevance for stakeholders in different countries to help prioritize site protection and to define research priorities. This is especially relevant in countries with a lack of expertise to assess the impacts of nitrogen on biodiversity and can represent an important step up from current knowledge in such countries.

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          Global biodiversity scenarios for the year 2100.

          Scenarios of changes in biodiversity for the year 2100 can now be developed based on scenarios of changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide, climate, vegetation, and land use and the known sensitivity of biodiversity to these changes. This study identified a ranking of the importance of drivers of change, a ranking of the biomes with respect to expected changes, and the major sources of uncertainties. For terrestrial ecosystems, land-use change probably will have the largest effect, followed by climate change, nitrogen deposition, biotic exchange, and elevated carbon dioxide concentration. For freshwater ecosystems, biotic exchange is much more important. Mediterranean climate and grassland ecosystems likely will experience the greatest proportional change in biodiversity because of the substantial influence of all drivers of biodiversity change. Northern temperate ecosystems are estimated to experience the least biodiversity change because major land-use change has already occurred. Plausible changes in biodiversity in other biomes depend on interactions among the causes of biodiversity change. These interactions represent one of the largest uncertainties in projections of future biodiversity change.
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            How a century of ammonia synthesis changed the world

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              Applications of next generation sequencing in molecular ecology of non-model organisms.

              As most biologists are probably aware, technological advances in molecular biology during the last few years have opened up possibilities to rapidly generate large-scale sequencing data from non-model organisms at a reasonable cost. In an era when virtually any study organism can 'go genomic', it is worthwhile to review how this may impact molecular ecology. The first studies to put the next generation sequencing (NGS) to the test in ecologically well-characterized species without previous genome information were published in 2007 and the beginning of 2008. Since then several studies have followed in their footsteps, and a large number are undoubtedly under way. This review focuses on how NGS has been, and can be, applied to ecological, population genetic and conservation genetic studies of non-model species, in which there is no (or very limited) genomic resources. Our aim is to draw attention to the various possibilities that are opening up using the new technologies, but we also highlight some of the pitfalls and drawbacks with these methods. We will try to provide a snapshot of the current state of the art for this rapidly advancing and expanding field of research and give some likely directions for future developments.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Data curationRole: Formal analysisRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Data curationRole: Formal analysisRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: Funding acquisitionRole: Project administrationRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Funding acquisitionRole: Project administrationRole: SupervisionRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: SupervisionRole: ValidationRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Formal analysisRole: Funding acquisitionRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Project administrationRole: SupervisionRole: ValidationRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: Editor
                Journal
                PLoS One
                PLoS ONE
                plos
                plosone
                PLoS ONE
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, CA USA )
                1932-6203
                21 June 2018
                2018
                : 13
                : 6
                : e0198955
                Affiliations
                [1 ] cE3c, Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Changes, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal
                [2 ] CERENA, Centro de Recursos Naturais e Ambiente, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
                [3 ] LEAF, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Universidade de Lisboa, Tapada da Ajuda, Lisboa, Portugal
                [4 ] NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH), Edinburgh Research Station, Bush Estate, Penicuik, Midlothian, United Kingdom
                Trent University, CANADA
                Author notes

                Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

                Author information
                http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5571-9619
                Article
                PONE-D-17-41572
                10.1371/journal.pone.0198955
                6013174
                29927996
                e48c0681-bc14-4384-ad46-cd8250eaccd7
                © 2018 Pinho et al

                This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

                History
                : 25 November 2017
                : 28 May 2018
                Page count
                Figures: 5, Tables: 1, Pages: 19
                Funding
                Funded by: Horizon 2020 Twinn Programme
                Award ID: 692331
                Funded by: FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia
                Award ID: BPD/75425/2010
                Award Recipient :
                Funded by: FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia
                Award ID: BPD/85419/2012
                Award Recipient :
                We are grateful for the funding through the project ‘NitroPortugal: Strengthening Portuguese research and innovation capacities in the field of excess reactive nitrogen’, funded by EU H2020-TWINN-2015 692331 and Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) through the Post-Doctoral grants SFRH/BPD/75425/2010 to Pedro Pinho and SFRH/BPD/85419/2012 to Teresa Dias, and Investigador FCT contract to Cristina Branquinho.
                Categories
                Research Article
                Engineering and Technology
                Environmental Engineering
                Pollution
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Ecology
                Biodiversity
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Ecology
                Biodiversity
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Habitats
                Engineering and Technology
                Environmental Engineering
                Pollution
                Air Pollution
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Conservation Science
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Ecology
                Ecosystems
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Ecology
                Ecosystems
                Engineering and Technology
                Environmental Engineering
                Pollution
                Water Pollution
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Ecology
                Ecosystems
                Forests
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Ecology
                Ecosystems
                Forests
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Terrestrial Environments
                Forests
                Custom metadata
                All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.

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                Uncategorized

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