Improving gender equity in academia depends on the workplace environment.

The iDiv Female Scientists initiative at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig in Germany was set up to connect women in science and to raise awareness of gender inequity. In this article we discuss the impact of the workplace environment on women in academia. Our experiences indicate that supportive workplace environments are more likely to discuss gender inequity, enabling "bottom-up" approaches where individual researchers can propose solutions to the problem.

Strategies for advancing inclusive biodiversity research through equitable practices and collective responsibility.

Biodiversity research is essential for addressing the global biodiversity crisis, necessitating diverse participation and perspectives of researchers from a wide range of backgrounds. However, conservation faces a significant inclusivity problem because local expertise from biodiversity-rich but economically disadvantaged regions is often underrepresented. This underrepresentation is driven by linguistic bias, undervalued contributions, parachute science practices, and capacity constraints.

Association of the three-minute step test with the occurrence of pulmonary exacerbations in children with cystic fibrosis: a cross-sectional study.

Background: Cystic fibrosis (CF) patients experience pulmonary exacerbations and the three-minute step test (3-min step test) may be a simple and easy-to-perform functional test to help identify such episodes. The present study aimed to evaluate the association of the 3-min step test with the occurrence of pulmonary exacerbations in children with CF.

Methods: Cross-sectional study of CF patients aged 6 years and older.

Rooting depth and xylem vulnerability are independent woody plant traits jointly selected by aridity, seasonality, and water table depth.

Evolutionary radiations of woody taxa within arid environments were made possible by multiple trait innovations including deep roots and embolism-resistant xylem, but little is known about how these traits have coevolved across the phylogeny of woody plants or how they jointly influence the distribution of species. We synthesized global trait and vegetation plot datasets to examine how rooting depth and xylem vulnerability across 188 woody plant species interact with aridity, precipitation seasonality, and water table depth to influence species occurrence probabilities across all biomes. Xylem resistance to embolism and rooting depth are independent woody plant traits that do not exhibit an interspecific trade-off.

Identifying Priorities, Targets, and Actions for the Long-term Social and Ecological Management of Invasive Non-Native Species.

Formulating effective management plans for addressing the impacts of invasive non-native species (INNS) requires the definition of clear priorities and tangible targets, and the recognition of the plurality of societal values assigned to these species. These tasks require a multi-disciplinary approach and the involvement of stakeholders. Here, we describe procedures to integrate multiple sources of information to formulate management priorities, targets, and high-level actions for the management of INNS.

Abundance of invasive grasses is dependent on fire regime and climatic conditions in tropical savannas.

Invasive grasses are a threat to some tropical savannas, but despite being fire-prone ecosystems, little is known about the relationships between fire season, climatic conditions and invasive species on these systems. We evaluated the response of the perennial invasive grasses Melinis minutiflora and Urochloa brizantha to three fire seasons in an open tropical savanna in South America: Early-Dry (May), Mid-Dry (July) and Late-Dry (October) in relation to unburned Controls. Moreover, we investigated how these responses were influenced by precipitation and extreme air temperatures.

BioTIME: A database of biodiversity time series for the Anthropocene.

Motivation: The BioTIME database contains raw data on species identities and abundances in ecological assemblages through time. These data enable users to calculate temporal trends in biodiversity within and amongst assemblages using a broad range of metrics. BioTIME is being developed as a community-led open-source database of biodiversity time series.