Journal Information
Issue
portada-S2530064425X00043Vol. 23. Issue 3.
Pages 151-218 (July - September 2025)
Policy forums
Legally protected, practically overlooked: The neglect of diffuse seeps in the conservation of Cerrado non-floodplain wetlands
Alessandra Bassani, Natashi A.L. Pilon, Franciele Parreira Peixoto, Caio R.C. Mattos, Fernando A.O. Silveira, Luciano Soares da Cunha, Rafael S. Oliveira
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:151-6
Highlights

  • Non-floodplain wetlands form where groundwater emerges to the surface, forming seeps.

  • Cerrado’s non-floodplain wetlands are key for regional and continental water security.

  • Brazil faces challenges to identify and protect diffuse seeps in wetlands.

  • Despite existing legal protection, Cerrado diffuse seep wetlands face severe threats.

  • Science-policy alignment is key to protecting non-floodplain wetlands effectively.

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Research letters
Ecosystem functional meltdown through biological annihilation in the world’s ecoregions
José F. González-Maya, I. Mauricio Vela-Vargas, Gerardo Ceballos
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:157-64
Highlights

  • Ecosystem function depends on species diversity; effects of species loss on functionality remain unclear.

  • Over 65% of functional diversity in Asia, Europe, and America comes from threatened species.

  • Ecosystems with species at high risk are highly vulnerable to ecological meltdown.

  • Ecological meltdown collapse could drastically affect human lifestyles and global environmental systems.

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The long-term absence of natural fires restructures the small-bodied mammal assemblages across a Protected Area of Brazilian Cerrado
Marco Rodrigo de Souza, Manoel dos Santos Filho, Mariella Butti de Freitas Guilherme, Juliano A. Bogoni
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:165-73
Highlights

  • Natural fires shape local environment and its biota.

  • Small-bodied mammal assemblages tend to homogenization in response to prolonged natural fire absence.

  • Big-fires are arguably disastrous, but the absence of natural fires reassembles the biotas.

  • Further technical discussions about fire management in Cerrado are needed.

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Açaí palm management and the multidimensional erosion of beta diversity across tree assemblages in the Amazon estuarine forest
Madson Antonio Benjamin Freitas, Arleu Barbosa Viana-Junior, Maria Fabíola Barros, José Leonardo Lima Magalhães, Elâine Maria dos Santos Ribeiro, Ima Célia Guimarães Vieira, Marcelo Tabarelli
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:174-82
Highlights

  • Increments in açaí palm density through management reduce the taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional beta diversity of the assemblages.

  • Increments support no winner tree species.

  • The Amazon estuarine forest is highly sensitive to increments on açaí palm density.

  • The promises by non-timber forest products can be fragilized by commercial demands.

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When waters rise: Biodiversity potentially affected on a major flooding in Southern Brazil
Daniela Oliveira de Lima, Fabrício Luiz Skupien, Alonso Moscon, Marcelo de Moraes Weber
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:183-90
Highlights

  • Major flooding in Southern Brazil affected 4,300 km² of native ecosystems.

  • PAs were heavily impacted, with 825 km² affected by the flooding (∼21% of total PAs).

  • Over 1,440 km² of Permanent Preservation Areas were flooded, 67% lacked native cover.

  • 747 tetrapod species were potentially affected, including 84 threatened species.

  • Threatened species were greatly impacted, requiring urgent conservation actions.

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Positive effects of an Atlantic Forest program of payment for ecosystem services on native vegetation and pasture quality
Ramon Felipe Bicudo da Silva, Felipe Altivo, James D.A. Millington, Yue Dou, Andrés Viña, Milton Cezar Ribeiro, Simone Aparecida Vieira, Jianguo Liu
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:191-9
Highlights

  • PES has potential to improve environmental quality and farm management.

  • Propensity score matching is a suitable tool to infer causality of policy interventions.

  • Natural vegetation recovery is significantly higher in participants of PES.

  • Pasture quality can be improved through management conservation techniques.

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Heterogeneity in mesocarnivore occupancy highlights the complexity of biodiversity changes in a threatened ecoregion
Marília Marques, Marcelo Magioli, Pedro Monterroso, Gonçalo Curveira-Santos, Camila Righetto Cassano
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:200-7
Highlights

  • Mesocarnivores are a heterogeneous group with distinct responses to environmental and anthropogenic factors.

  • Species’ occupancy exhibited strong interspecific and temporal variation in two protected areas.

  • Anthropogenic disturbances can benefit some mesocarnivores, but is disruptive for the overall mammal assemblage.

  • Forest structure on sampling sites is a key driver of mesocarnivore occupancy.

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Climatic driver of chytrid prevalence in the Critically Endangered Admirable Redbelly Toad
Mariana Retuci Pontes, Michelle Abadie, Luisa P. Ribeiro, Guilherme Augusto-Alves, Márcio Borges-Martins, C. Guilherme Becker, Luís Felipe Toledo
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:208-13
Highlights

  • First record of chytrid in the microendemic Melanophryniscus admirabilis;

  • Chytrid was consistently infecting the only known M. admirabilis population;

  • Temperature influences chytrid dynamics in a threatened toad population;

  • Chytrid had no effect on the body condition of M. admirabilis.

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Essays and perspectives
Wildfires and their toll on Brazil: Who's counting the cost?
Ernandes Sobreira, Wilkinson Lopes Lázaro, Breno Dias Vitorino, Angélica Vilas Boas da Frota, Carlos Eduardo Frickmann Young, Derick Victor de Souza Campos, Cleverson Ricardo Soares Viana, Edvagner de Oliveira, ... Juliano A. Bogoni
Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation. 2025;23:214-7
Highlights

  • Wildfires in Brazil cause billion-dollar losses, harming biodiversity, health, and the economy.

  • Wildfire spreads toxic smoke across South America, straining the healthcare system.

  • Wildfires cause massive biodiversity loss, and we barely know how to measure it.

  • Despite substantial economic losses in tropical habitats, the Global South remains a low priority.

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Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation