Human disturbance has devastated natural populations and ecosystems across the planet.
Organisms can adapt to some of these changes, either through adaptations acquired by …

Urban fragmentation can reduce gene flow that isolates populations, reduces genetic
diversity and increases population differentiation, all of which have negative conservation …

Highlights•Black widow spiders experience an extreme urban heat island (UHI) in Phoenix,
AZ, USA•Behavioural plasticity may allow urban animals to survive urban disturbance.•We …

Widow spiders belong to the cosmopolitan genus Latrodectus (Araneae: Theridiidae), of
which five species are found in North America. In part due to their medical importance and …

Background Predicting invasiveness requires an understanding of the propensity of a given
species to thrive in areas with novel ecological challenges. Evaluation of realized niche shift …

Ecological stoichiometry (ES) offers a framework to identify the mechanisms that allow pest
species to thrive following human-induced rapid environmental change (HIREC) …

Accurate evaluations of habitat preference are key to understanding optimal conditions for
wildlife survival and reproduction. Habitat selection, however, usually is evaluated using a …

As the planet is rapidly urbanizing, understanding the ecological effects of urbanization is a
grand challenge for modern biology. For example, increased city temperatures known as the …