Why Biodiversity Loss Matters More in a Stressful World Click on the article title to read more.

Nice commentary on our recent work:
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Somehow reparation for the rejection at first submission of the paper ;-)

Limitations of chemical monitoring hinder aquatic risk evaluations on the macroscale Macroscale evaluations of chemical monitoring data require the integration of chemical, spatial, and temporal dimensions. Here, we linked 64 million US surface water monitoring records (1900 chemicals...

A large-scale analysis of U.S. water quality data published last year in Science revealed that most toxic chemicals remain poorly characterized or undetected in routine monitoring. https://scim.ag/4alqHdl #WorldWaterDay

Der Wissenschaftliche Beirat zum Nationalen Aktionsplan Pflanzenschutz warnt: Die von der EU-Kommission geplanten Vereinfachungen bei der Pflanzenschutzmittelregulierung könnten erhebliche Risiken für Mensch und Umwelt mit sich bringen.
www.uni-due.de/2026-03-12-g...

How should you report results from thermal tolerance experiments? We have developed a reporting guideline. Very nice work by Helena Bayat. doi.org/10.1016/j.jt...

Portraitbild von Prof. Dr. Daniel Hering mit Text: Porf. Dr. Daniel Hering in Endrunde für Umweltpreis. Wasserforscher für Frontiers Planet Prize nominiert

Dr. Daniel Hering, #UDE -Professor für #AquatischeÖkologie, ist für den renommierten #FrontiersPlanetPrize nominiert worden – als einer von 3 Forschenden in 🇩🇪! Wer den mit insgesamt 3 Mio. US-Dollar dotierten Preis erhalten wird, entscheidet eine internationale Jury. 🤞 www.uni-due.de/2026-01-27-d...

In fish, low doses of common pesticide speed aging and death Polluted lakes and lab experiments highlight harms of chronic exposure to chlorpyrifos

A study found that a widely used insecticide, chlorpyrifos, speeds up aging in a common lake fish by shortening the protective caps on its chromosomes, and leads to its premature death. https://scim.ag/49Hp7jU

The Molecular Toxicology Group at the Helmholtz Centre of Environmental Research (UFZ) is looking for a creative and ambitious PhD candidate to use novel approaches to remove persistent PFAS from living organisms.🧬🐟🧪📈

Read more 👉 rptu.de/s/xphztf

Application closing: 16.01.2026

How to evaluate the relative risks of pesticides and identify lower risk alternatives? This question in light of the EU COM Omnibus suggestions to lower environmental protection. Within the #EU PARC project we developed a benchmark concept and discuss its implications doi.org/10.1016/j.en...

Two individuals in protective gear spraying pesticides across a field of crops Image credit: Shutterstock/NataliAlba.

#Exposome research comes of age: After 20 years, the field of #exposomics is poised to reveal the complex, interacting drivers of #disease. A PNAS News Feature: https://ow.ly/9QOg50XPn5J

#exposure #pesticides #pollution #wildfires #biobank #genomics #PublicHealth

Limitations of chemical monitoring hinder aquatic risk evaluations on the macroscale Macroscale evaluations of chemical monitoring data require the integration of chemical, spatial, and temporal dimensions. Here, we linked 64 million US surface water monitoring records (1900 chemicals...

An analysis of U.S. water quality data reveals that most toxic chemicals remain poorly characterized or undetected in routine monitoring.

The findings in Science suggest that the true scale of chemical risk to biodiversity and ecosystems may be significantly underestimated. https://scim.ag/4alqHdl

Our new paper shows that even over decades protected areas have offered little improvements of freshwater biodiversity. We suggest avenues for improvement. Fantastic study lead by P. Haase and J. Sinclair. #OA rdcu.be/eU5jm
presse.senckenberg.de/en/pressemel...

Cover image for the December issue of Nature Ecology & Evolution. The image shows a male Korean seahorse and its young. The cover line reads "Role reversals"

Our December issue is now live: www.nature.com/natecolevol/...

Featuring research on 🧪

🦏 rhinocerotid dispersal in the mid-Cenozoic
🐟 biodiversity responses to freshwater stressors
🦋 evolution of butterfly eyespots

Cover shows a Korean seahorse, from Meyer et al. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Multiple-stressor effects on the biodiversity-ecosystem function relationship were largely predictable from single-stressor impacts. Great community effort with many colleagues from @crc-resist.bsky.social

Effects of Biodiversity Loss on Freshwater Ecosystem Functions Increase With the Number of Stressors The paper reports results of a meta-analysis addressing the effect of multiple stressors on the relationship between biodiversity and four measures of ecosystem function in freshwater ecosystems. We ...

New paper out on how stressor numbers influence biodiversity - ecosystem function relationships in freshwater ecosystems. We considered four measures of ecosystem function and found that the positive BEF relationship becomes stronger as the number of stressors increases. OA @ doi.org/10.1111/gcb....

New study on the spatial dimension of multiple stressors. Gemma Burgazzi (iDiv) did a great job in running this mesocosm experiment. Effects of single stressors cascaded along the network, with stronger downstream effects. Thanks to all contributors! @leeselab.bsky.social doi.org/10.1002/ecog...

Meta-analysis-derived estimates of stressor–response associations for riverine organism groups - Nature Ecology & Evolution This global meta-analysis of freshwater stressor–response relationships reveals that the biodiversity loss of five riverine organism groups reflects elevated salinity, oxygen depletion and fine sedime...

This global meta-analysis of freshwater stressor–response relationships reveals that the biodiversity loss of five riverine organism groups reflects elevated salinity, oxygen depletion and fine sediment accumulation 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Data source and code are of course freely available. And hopefully a useful source for future predictive models in aquatic stress ecology.

And we can now also align species richness to combinations of stressors (Fig 4):

We observed consistent relation with salinity, oxygen depletion, and fine sediment accumulation, while the relation with nutrient enrichment and warming varied among groups. The results allow us, amongst others, to predict how species richness changes with increasing stressors intensity (Fig. 3):

The figure (1a) shows the probability distribution on how species number of the different organism groups are associated with increasing stress intensity. Invertebrates are generally most sensitive and species number is negatively associated to six of the stressors.

We extracted data on 1,332 stressor–response relationships from literature and ran Generalised Linear Mixed Models for each dataset individually. With the resulting estimates (e.g. regression coefficients) we performed a Bayesian meta-analysis.
In short, these are the results:

Meta-analysis-derived estimates of stressor–response associations for riverine organism groups - Nature Ecology & Evolution This global meta-analysis of freshwater stressor–response relationships reveals that the biodiversity loss of five riverine organism groups reflects elevated salinity, oxygen depletion and fine sedime...

Led by Wim Kaijser, we published a global analysis on how five different organism groups respond to seven stressor categories. New paper in Nature Ecology & Evolution. www.nature.com/articles/s41....

Bild mit Text. Es zeigt die Süßwasserkrebsart Caridina Dennerli. Text: Süßwassercheck für Bachflohkrebs bis Quappe. Weltatlas der Hitzetoleranz

Wenn das #Wasser wärmer wird, gerät das Leben aus dem Gleichgewicht. Forscher:innen der #UDE haben mit #ThermoFresh die weltweit größte, frei zugängliche Datensammlung zur Hitzetoleranz von #Süßwasserarten veröffentlicht.
📸: UDE/Sebastian Prati
👉 https://www.uni-due.de/2025-10-07-thermofresh

This is figure 1, which shows the summary results from a survey of 306 scientists on data reuse.

In a Consensus Statement in Nature Microbiology, a consortium of #microbiome scientists discusses current sequencing data sharing policies and proposes the use of a Data Reuse Information tag to promote equitable and collaborative data sharing. go.nature.com/4o1Gl1f 🧪

Photo of field crew conducting electroshock sampling for fish as part of the US EPA National Rivers and Streams Assessment in Little Hunting Creek in Virginia, USA. Photographer: Kevin Biallas

Changing water temperatures and human-driven introductions of fish have altered the composition of fish populations in streams and rivers across the USA over the past three decades, a study in Nature suggests. go.nature.com/47ZCcWH 🧪

Diverging fish biodiversity trends in cold and warm rivers and streams - Nature In the past three decades, fish abundance, richness and uniqueness have diverged across cold and warm streams, and the effects on native fish communities of stream warming and increases in introduced fishes have magnified each other.

Nature research paper: Diverging fish biodiversity trends in cold and warm rivers and streams

go.nature.com/42JFObR

Photo of field crew conducting electroshock sampling for fish as part of the US EPA National Rivers and Streams Assessment in Little Hunting Creek in Virginia, USA. Photographer: Kevin Biallas

Changing water temperatures and human-driven introductions of fish have altered the composition of fish populations in streams and rivers across the USA over the past three decades, a study in Nature suggests. go.nature.com/47ZCcWH 🧪

Diverging fish biodiversity trends in cold and warm rivers and streams Nature - In the past three decades, fish abundance, richness and uniqueness have diverged across cold and warm streams, and the effects on native fish communities of stream warming and increases in...

Author link: rdcu.be/eH0l8

Diverging fish biodiversity trends in cold and warm rivers and streams - Nature In the past three decades, fish abundance, richness and uniqueness have diverged across cold and warm streams, and the effects on native fish communities of stream warming and increases in introduced fishes have magnified each other.

Exciting collaboration with colleagues from the US and Frederik de Laender - lead by S. Rumschlag and Mike Mahon - on how climate change has lead to alterations in US fish diversity over the last decades. Paper just out: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Congratulations to Marie Brassuer for winning the poster prize at the DGL 2025 in Frankfurt! Great to have such a designer in our group 😀