Coexistence: The Ecology and Evolution of Tropical Biodiversity

Summary

• This book is about tropical biology in action - how biologists grapple with the ecology and evolution of the great species diversity in tropical rainforests and coral reefs. Tropical rainforests are home to 50% of all the plant and animal species on earth, though they cover only about 2% of the planet. Coral reefs hold 25% of the world's marine diversity, though they represent only 0.1% of the world's surface. The increase in species richness from the poles to the tropics has remained enigmatic to naturalists for more than 200 years. How have so many species evolved in the tropics? How can so many species coexist there?
• At a time when rainforests and coral reefs are shrinking, when the earth is facing what has been called the sixth mass extinction, understanding the evolutionary ecology of the tropics is everyone's business. Despite the fundamental importance of the tropics to all of life on earth, tropical biology has evolved relatively slowly and with difficulties - economic, political, and environmental. This book is also about tropical science in context, situated in the complex socio-political history, and the rich rainforests and coral reefs of Panama.

Subject

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI)

Contact information

Institutional History Division, Smithsonian Institution Archives, 600 Maryland Avenue, SW, Washington, D.C. 20024-2520, [email protected]

Category

Smithsonian History Bibliography

Date

2016

Topic

• Rain forest ecology
• History of Science and Technology
• Coral reef ecology
• Natural History
• Evolution (Biology)
• Ecology
• Biodiversity
• Tropical Biology
• Biological diversity
• Natural history

Place

Panama

Physical description

Number of pages: 296; Page numbers: 1-296

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