Researchers have developed a new scientific method to estimate the time lag between the introduction of an alien species and its extensive spread. For New Zealand weed species, the study estimated that the average lag was around 20-30 years. Although this may seem to be a long time, seemingly rare but fast-spreading species could become tomorrow's harmful weeds.

Human pressures on freshwater resources have seriously reduced the security of water for people and river biodiversity across the world, according to a recent study. Almost 80 per cent of the world's population is at high risk from threats to water security and 65 per cent of river habitats are under threat.

Humans are more dependent upon ecosystem services and biodiversity than ever before, according to researchers. A new study has demonstrated that human well-being derived from three major ecosystem services has been increasing in 152 countries, particularly in countries considered to be biodiversity hotspots.

Although the value of biodiversity and ecosystem services has been recognised, it is still not fully integrated into policy-making. A new report has developed an action plan that recommends that governments create a 'Natural Capital' minister in the Finance Ministry, develop a set of Natural Capital Accounts and form an inter-departmental committee to oversee programmes in this area.

Past economic activity is more likely to explain the current pattern of biological invasions across Europe than recent human activities, according to a new study. It can take several decades before a newly introduced species becomes established and spreads, which may mean that recent invasions caused by current economic activities could create an 'invasion debt' for future generations.

New research from the Mediterranean suggests that marine ecosystems are disturbed by the organic food and faeces waste from fish farms, even when the pollutants themselves can no longer be detected. The study recommends calculating an individual pollution 'carrying capacity' for each type of marine habitat, and provides the first published estimate for a ma??rl habitat.

Researchers have demonstrated how the ERICA Integrated Approach can be used to assess the effect of releasing radiation into the environment on local wildlife in a real-world situation. The study applied ERICA to a river in Norway and found that local wildlife was only exposed to low levels of radioactivity from the routine aquatic discharges of a nearby research reactor, although historical exposure was higher.

Conservation efforts should focus on species that have recently declined in number, are harmless or are perceived as high value, according to a European public survey. Participants also felt that disappearing habitats should be targeted for protection. The results suggest that, by choosing different criteria that more closely match the public's values and criteria, conservationists could improve public support for their work.

Scientists have evaluated two decades of research into declining biodiversity and concluded unequivocally that loss of species richness leads to a reduction in how well ecosystems function. The researchers evaluated the evidence for key biodiversity theories and predicted that scientific progress in the next five to ten years will provide the information we need to efficiently conserve certain ecological processes.

A proactive approach to biodiversity loss ??? where conservation of a species starts before it becomes endangered ??? could save millions of euros compared to the cost of recovering a population already in serious decline, according to new research.

Scientists have proposed new recommendations to increase the species diversity and sustainability of Mediterranean forests, since programmes to enhance reforestation by planting vast areas of pine trees have not been as successful as planned.

Researchers have identified areas of Italy that have a climate capable of sustaining a population of tiger mosquitoes, an invasive mosquito species that can carry several human diseases. The findings also indicate how these areas will expand as the climate changes in future.

Over 160,000 seabirds are accidentally killed by global longline fisheries each year, according to a recent study. Better monitoring and standards are needed to reduce bycatch of seabirds in fisheries, including increased on-board monitoring of bycatches and mandatory best-practice measures, say the researchers.

A new European study has assessed whether seed banks are successfully conserving European plant species threatened by extinction. The findings indicate that threatened species are only partly conserved by seed banks, and that these facilities need to focus their future efforts on filling gaps in their collections.

There is a need for conservation strategies to consider the changing factors that threaten endangered species, such as climate change. Focusing on the European otter, new research has indicated that climate change will change this important freshwater species' distribution, which may mean that existing conservation areas no longer offer protection.

A new model has been developed that could help metropolitan areas adapt to climate change by increasing ecosystem services provided by green spaces and farmland through calculating the percentage of evapotranspiring surface for different types of land use and the degree of fragmentation between ecosystems. To demonstrate how it works, researchers have applied this 'land use suitability strategy' model to an Italian municipality.

Global food security under a changing climate is possible if the vital role of healthy ecosystems is recognised, according to a recent study. The researchers suggest that an ecosystem-based approach must be integrated with other measures to tackle food security under climate change, to protect ecosystems and supply the essential services on which humanity depends.

One strategy to halt the loss of biodiversity has been to create protected areas in the sea and on land. However, a new study suggests that unless additional measures are taken, particularly those that tackle human population growth and the increased use of natural resources, even the development of new protected areas will be unable to reverse the trend of global biodiversity loss.

Transport infrastructure and urban sprawl are increasingly dividing up landscapes in Europe, threatening wildlife. A new report has quantified landscape fragmentation across 28 European countries. To prevent further negative environmental impacts, it recommends protecting unfragmented areas, monitoring fragmentation and applying fragmentation analysis in planning.

Preserving species and the ecosystems in which they live is highly important to the progress of biomedical research. This is the conclusion made by researchers in an analysis of biodiversity's significance, which highlights the role of animals and microbes in improving our understanding of genetics, the regeneration of tissues and organs, and immunity.

By 2090, up to 76.7 million more people in Africa could be at risk of infection by the parasite that causes sleeping sickness, according to recent research. The study predicted which areas of Africa would be at greatest risk in future.

The Chernobyl nuclear disaster is still having an impact on local biodiversity more than 25 years after the event, according to a new study. Researchers in France and the US suggest that rare bird species have been particularly affected by the accident and that genetic changes in plants and animals caused by radiation are being passed down the generations.

According to new research, several areas of the Antarctic are at considerable risk from the establishment of 'alien' plants accidentally carried by visitors to the region. The findings demonstrate that invasive species pose risks even in remote areas and that these risks are likely to increase as the climate changes.

New research has outlined a four-step approach to multipurpose wetland creation or restoration: clarifying the objectives, defining the scale and analysing possible conflicts, before finally defining a strategy.

Ticks that are able to transmit Lyme disease are more abundant in deciduous oak forests than pine forests, according to a study conducted in Belgium, which provides an example of how landscape can influence human health. To help prevent tick attacks and the incidence of Lyme disease, the researchers suggest increased efforts are needed to raise public awareness of control measures, such as protective clothing and repellants.

Scientists have called for tighter biosecurity measures to reduce the growing threat to biodiversity, food security and ecosystems from fungal infections. Their study reveals that fungal disease outbreaks are on the rise around the world, and will cause further damage unless urgent steps are taken to restrict their unintentional spread through international trade and transport.

To preserve rich biodiversity in protected areas of tropical forests, safeguarding the surrounding area can be just as important as safeguarding the park or reserve itself. This is according to a new study, which assessed the ecological health of 60 protected areas across the tropics.

A synthesis of 192 studies has provided a quantitative estimate of the impact of the loss of plant biodiversity on ecosystem primary production, showing that this impact could be as great as that of other major environmental changes, such as climate warming, rising ozone levels and ocean acidification. They examined the effects of biodiversity loss on primary plant production of biomass and decomposition of plant litter, both of which underpin the carbon cycle and provision of key ecosystem services.

Intensive agriculture is widely recognised as a major cause of declining farmland bird populations. New research has identified which aspects of agricultural intensification are most damaging to farmland bird numbers, examining bird populations at seven farmland sites across Europe. The researchers found that simplified landscapes created by intensive agriculture reduced bird numbers at the sites.

A recent study, which assessed 100 streams across Europe, reveals that a key ecosystem process, leaf litter breakdown, is slowed when nutrient concentrations in the water are either very low or very high, has the highest potential at moderate nutrient concentrations and is inhibited in heavily polluted waters, implying that the relationship between nutrient levels and ecosystem processes, such as leaf litter breakdown, is complex. The researchers suggest that including an assessment of the functioning of ecosystem processes can make an important contribution to the overall evaluation of stream health.

A new aerial survey is the first to assess the possible impact of a research station in Antarctica on magnetic fields. Estimations indicated that the station generated a magnetic field that extends up to 650 metres from the station with a peak strength of 2800 nanotesla (nT) within 100 metres from the station on the ground. This may have implications for organisms in Antarctica that are negatively affected by magnetic fields but further research is needed to investigate this.

Over the next 30 years, there is a vital need for planners to shape urban expansion to minimise the impact on biodiversity and carbon losses from land-use change, according to a recent study.

A recent study sheds light on why some alien species are more likely to become invasive than others. The research in Switzerland found that the alien Spanish slug is better able to survive under changing environmental conditions than the native Black slug, thanks to its robust 'Jack-of-all-trades' nature.

Reducing the extinction risk to all threatened bird species by at least one category on the IUCN Red List by 2020 would cost US$0.875 - 1.23 billion (???0.671-0.94) per year, according to a recent study. To achieve this level of support would require an additional US$0.769 ??? 1.08 (???0.59- 0.82) billion per year over and above existing conservation funding for threatened birds.

Careful choice of tree species and sites could transform plantations into refuges for woodland plant diversity, new research from Ireland suggests. Plantations of native species on or near historic woodland and those with adequate light levels below the tree canopy were found to support more plant species.

Falling levels of insect pollination are causing declining yields of important agricultural crops. However, new research from South Africa now indicates that planting small patches of native flowers in agricultural fields can be a profitable and sustainable method of increasing pollination and yield.

Future decades could see shifts in phytoplankton populations, leading to less diversity among phytoplankton strains in increasingly warm tropical oceans, researchers predict. These microorganisms play an important role in regulating the Earth's climate.

Decreasing biodiversity in an ecosystem can increase the spread of disease, research suggests. Researchers studying amphibian communities in natural wetland ecosystems as well as controlled experiments have shown that as diversity increased, infection rates dropped.

Little is known about the organisms that live within soil, although they play a vital role in the biological processes that support life on Earth. In a recent study, researchers calculated the relative risk of pressures caused by human activity on soil biodiversity in the EU, showing that intensive land use has the greatest impact.

Biodiversity could play a key role in preventing future outbreaks of malaria in tropical forests, according to a new study. Results indicate that a greater number of mosquito species could increase competition for mosquitoes that spread malarial parasites, whilst more vertebrate species could increase the likelihood that malarial parasites end up in 'dead-end hosts' that are unable to transmit the disease any further.

Research suggests that climate change could alter the structure and function of temperate peat bogs and that these changes are primarily driven by rising temperatures, rather than periods of temporary drought. An average temperature rise above 1??C could permanently shift moss-covered peat bogs into bogs predominately covered with trees, affecting their ability to store carbon and the existing carbon stocks in them.

Controlled fires could help the regeneration capacity of some insects in regions of intensively managed forests, according to a recent study of Finnish forests that are part of an EU LIFE restoration project. Results indicated that fire can be an effective conservation measure but its impact depends on the region???s history and context.

Temporary ponds and their varying water levels provide the conditions for valuable wildlife habitat. A study in Crete, conducted under the LIFE-Nature project Actions for the Conservation of Mediterranean Temporary Ponds in Crete, has demonstrated these ponds contain varied collections of seeds and that these ???seed banks??? could play an important role in vegetation recovery after droughts.

The litter size of the endangered European mink is less than half of that of its main competitor, the invasive American mink, research shows. The higher fertility of the American mink may allow rapid population growth of this species, threatening European mink with extinction.

The damaging impacts of the invasive alien plant, the giant hogweed, decline over time, new research from the Czech Republic has concluded. Although this plant initially reduces the native species richness of the grasslands it colonises, the study found that numbers of native species increased again in sites that had been colonised by hogweed for 40 years or longer.

Trawling can disturb the seabed, impacting habitats and biodiversity. Results from a new study in the North Sea have shown that changes in the distribution of trawling activity – the result of fishers' choices among fishing grounds and the effects of fisheries' regulations - have greater implications for the overall state of seabed habitat than the protection that might be provided by proposed Marine Protected Areas.

Researchers have developed a new method of mapping seafloor habitats, which uses easily measured environmental properties to infer the type and extent of seafloor ecosystems. It could help in the effective implementation of the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive, the researchers suggest.

A briefing document, providing policymakers with key information on environmental impact assessments of deep-sea mining, has been published. The authors describe the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process in detail to aid management and policy decisions regarding these sensitive habitats.

Guidelines to establish reserves protecting deep-sea hydrothermal vents and cold seep ecosystems have been proposed. A group of stakeholders from 14 countries have put forward the Dinard Guidelines for Chemosynthetic Ecological Reserves, to help design and manage reserves for these unique ecosystems in national and international waters.

Depositing dredged material on the seabed can significantly reduce the functioning of marine habitats, diminishing the amount of food available for fish and other animals further up the food chain, new research suggests. The author of the study calls for inclusion of this effect into environmental impact assessments of dredging.