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Podcasts

Functional Ecology posted its first podcast in August 2011 and its second in October 2011. Visit the Podcast page for details.

2010 Impact Factor increase

Functional Ecology now has an impact factor of 4.645 and is ranked 18 out of 129 journals on the ISI ecology list.

New members of the Editorial Board appointed

Carly Stevens, The Open University, UK (September 2011)
Tim Higham, University of California, Riverside, USA (September 2011)
Theunis Piersma, University of Groningen & Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ) (January 2012)
Nick Ostle, Lancaster University, UK (January 2012)

Papers in the News 2011

Urban et al Trees adapt to poor levels of sunlight to effectively process carbon. This study by Czech researchers shows the ability of trees to adapt to light conditions, and even increase their intake of carbon for photosynthesis in poor light. Science Daily, Physorg.com

Scott et al Life in the really slow lane: loggerhead sea turtles reach maturity at an older age than other reptiles.
Read more on BBC, Tehran Times

Torregrossa et al How plant-eating mammals control their appetite for poison. The paper is now free to download.
Read more on The Salt Lake Tribune, Science Daily, Bioscience technology

Speed et al Browsing interacts with climate to determine tree-ring increment.
Read more on The New York Times, Science Daily, Life sciences-net , Environmental Reaserch Web

Lujan et al Do wood grazing fishes partition their niche?: Morphological and isotopic evidence for trophic segregation in Neotropical Loricariidae.
Read more on Practical Fishkeeping

Pollux & Reznick Fish placenta is unfavourable survival strategy.
Read more on PhysOrg.com, NWO

Trade-off between travel distance and prioritization of high-reward sites in traplining bumblebees by Lihoreau et al
Read more on New Scientist, Daily Mail, PhysOrg.com & Science Daily

Climate change is turning artificial habitats into ecological traps from Huang & Pike.
Read more on Taiwan Today, Australian Geographic

Coslovsky & Richner: Researchers have found that female birds exposed to predators while ovulating produce smaller offspring than unexposed females.
News Coverage on: sify.com, NatureNews highlighted this paper with an article by Matt Kaplan
Also featured in F1000 Magazine The Scientist

De Casas et al: Sun & shade leaves play different roles in tree canopies.
The shape and physiology of leaves within the tree canopy is not constant, and can vary depending on their position within the tree crown.
News Coverage on: BioScholar, PhysOrg.com and Science Daily

The better to eat you with: functional correlates of tooth structure in bats
Santana et al
This excellent paper cleverly applies GPS technology to teeth. Visit the BBC for picture series and the following sites for press stories.
Medical News Today, Bio-Medicine News,
Science Daily, Newswise,
Physorg.com, Smithsonian Science

"Secret life of bees now a little less secret" Sedivy et al's ground breaking paper shows that plants protect their pollen chemically and bees need physiological adaptations to digest the pollen.
Photo: Osmia bicornis female enters her nest with a full pollen load ©A Krebs
ScienceDaily, Cordis News, NewsGuide.us,
physorg.com, sciencecentric.com,
news.bioscholar.com, biologynews.net,

Author Summaries:
To read author summaries of papers recently published in Functional Ecology click here.

Full archive available online
Every issue of Functional Ecology is available online from volume 1 issue 1 (1987) to 2003 through JSTOR and 1997 to the latest published Early View papers through Wiley Online Library.

Articles free after two years
The British Ecological Society is committed to making ecological research as accessible as possible. Papers published in Functional Ecology will therefore be made freely available online two years after issue publication, back to 1998, through Wiley Online Library.

Free access in the developing world
Free online access to this journal is available within institutions in the developing world through the AGORA Initiative with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the OARE Initiative (Online Access to Research in the Environment) with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).