Urban ecophysiology : beyond costs, stress and biomarkers
Isaksson, Caroline LU
(2020)
In The Journal of experimental biology
223.
- Abstract
Natural habitats are rapidly declining due to urbanisation, with a concomitant decline in biodiversity in highly urbanised areas. Yet thousands of different species have colonised urban environments. These organisms are exposed to novel urban conditions, which are sometimes beneficial, but most often challenging, such as increased ambient temperature, chemicals, noise and light pollution, dietary alterations and disturbance by humans. Given the fundamental role of physiological responses in coping with such conditions, certain physiological systems such as the redox system, metabolism and hormones are thought to specifically influence organisms' ability to persist and cope with urbanisation. However, these physiological systems often... (More)
Natural habitats are rapidly declining due to urbanisation, with a concomitant decline in biodiversity in highly urbanised areas. Yet thousands of different species have colonised urban environments. These organisms are exposed to novel urban conditions, which are sometimes beneficial, but most often challenging, such as increased ambient temperature, chemicals, noise and light pollution, dietary alterations and disturbance by humans. Given the fundamental role of physiological responses in coping with such conditions, certain physiological systems such as the redox system, metabolism and hormones are thought to specifically influence organisms' ability to persist and cope with urbanisation. However, these physiological systems often show mixed responses to urbanisation. Does this mean that some individuals, populations or species are resilient to the urban environmental challenges? Or is something missing from our analyses, leading us to erroneous conclusions regarding the impact of urbanisation? To understand the impact of urbanisation, I argue that a more integrated mechanistic and ecological approach is needed, along with experiments, in order to fully understand the physiological responses; without knowledge of their ecological and evolutionary context, physiological measures alone can be misinterpreted. Furthermore, we need to further investigate the causes of and capacity for individual plasticity in order to understand not only the impact of urbanisation, but also species resilience. I argue that abiotic and biotic urban factors can interact (e.g. pollution with micro- and macronutrients) to either constrain or relax individual physiological responses - and, thereby, plasticity - on a temporal and/or spatial scale, which can lead to erroneous conclusions regarding the impact of urbanisation.
(Less)
- author
- Isaksson, Caroline
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2020-11-18
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- Anthropogenic, Endocrinology, Environmental stress, Nutrition, Oxidative stress
- in
- The Journal of experimental biology
- volume
- 223
- article number
- jeb203794
- publisher
- The Company of Biologists Ltd
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85096407896
- pmid:33208405
- ISSN
- 1477-9145
- DOI
- 10.1242/jeb.203794
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 06760229-d449-4e8f-9b59-fbde6bf37f85
- date added to LUP
- 2020-11-30 13:28:35
- date last changed
- 2024-07-25 05:33:05
@article{06760229-d449-4e8f-9b59-fbde6bf37f85,
abstract = {{<p>Natural habitats are rapidly declining due to urbanisation, with a concomitant decline in biodiversity in highly urbanised areas. Yet thousands of different species have colonised urban environments. These organisms are exposed to novel urban conditions, which are sometimes beneficial, but most often challenging, such as increased ambient temperature, chemicals, noise and light pollution, dietary alterations and disturbance by humans. Given the fundamental role of physiological responses in coping with such conditions, certain physiological systems such as the redox system, metabolism and hormones are thought to specifically influence organisms' ability to persist and cope with urbanisation. However, these physiological systems often show mixed responses to urbanisation. Does this mean that some individuals, populations or species are resilient to the urban environmental challenges? Or is something missing from our analyses, leading us to erroneous conclusions regarding the impact of urbanisation? To understand the impact of urbanisation, I argue that a more integrated mechanistic and ecological approach is needed, along with experiments, in order to fully understand the physiological responses; without knowledge of their ecological and evolutionary context, physiological measures alone can be misinterpreted. Furthermore, we need to further investigate the causes of and capacity for individual plasticity in order to understand not only the impact of urbanisation, but also species resilience. I argue that abiotic and biotic urban factors can interact (e.g. pollution with micro- and macronutrients) to either constrain or relax individual physiological responses - and, thereby, plasticity - on a temporal and/or spatial scale, which can lead to erroneous conclusions regarding the impact of urbanisation.</p>}},
author = {{Isaksson, Caroline}},
issn = {{1477-9145}},
keywords = {{Anthropogenic; Endocrinology; Environmental stress; Nutrition; Oxidative stress}},
language = {{eng}},
month = {{11}},
publisher = {{The Company of Biologists Ltd}},
series = {{The Journal of experimental biology}},
title = {{Urban ecophysiology : beyond costs, stress and biomarkers}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1242/jeb.203794}},
doi = {{10.1242/jeb.203794}},
volume = {{223}},
year = {{2020}},
}