Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment

Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment is a benefit of membership of the Ecological Society of America. International in scope and interdisciplinary in approach, Frontiers focuses on current ecological issues and environmental challenges. Frontiers is aimed at professional ecologists and scientists working in related disciplines.
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Molecular detection techniques can be used in species monitoring, pathogen surveillance, dietary analysis, and a variety of other ecological applications. In the February 2020 issue of Frontiers, Mosher et al. present a communication framework that can help to guide collaborative partnerships between laboratory scientists, resource managers, and ecologists who employ these techniques.

Although little brown bats (Myotis lucifugus) continue to experience widespread mortality in North America due to white-nose syndrome, preexisting adaptive genetic variation may have helped some populations begin to recover through natural selection. One component of a species’ adaptive capacity is evolutionary potential: the capacity to evolve genetically based changes in traits that increase fitness in response to novel or changing conditions. Evolutionary potential is critical in estimating extinction risk but is challenging to measure. In the November issue of Frontiers, Forester et al. explain how conservation practitioners can assess species’ vulnerability more comprehensively by including various proxies of evolutionary potential in recovery planning and management decision making.