Aim Understanding the variation in community composition and species abundances (i.e., β‐diversity) is at the heart of community ecology. A common approach to examine β‐diversity is to evaluate directional variation in community composition by measuring the decay in the similarity among pairs of communities along spatial or environmental distance. We provide the first global synthesis of taxonomic and functional distance decay...

Understanding the demographic history and genetic make‐up of colonizing species is critical for inferring population sources and colonization routes. This is of main interest for designing accurate control measures in areas newly colonized by vector species of economically important pathogens. The biting midge Culicoides imicola is a major vector of orbiviruses to livestock. Historically, the distribution of this species was l...

Understanding dispersal patterns, population structure and connectivity among populations is helpful in the management and conservation of threatened species. Molecular markers are useful tools as indirect estimators of these characteristics. In this study, we assess the population genetic structure of the orange coral Astroides calycularis in the Alboran Sea at local and regional scale, and at three localities outside of this...