Biology subjects

Busana, M.

Publications and source records attributed to Busana, M..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Strategic citations for a fairer academic landscape

Scientific publishing is increasingly dominated by for-profit journals, which attract prestige and submissions through high impact factors (IF). While some of these partly reinvest in research and dissemination and can be considered academia-friendly, non-profit journals - those that fully reinvest revenue into the academic community - often struggle for visibility despite promoting more equitable publishing models. Using citation data from over 70,000 publications in ecology and evolution, we show that citation practices are siloed: for-profit journals disproportionately cite other for-profit journals, academia-friendly journals preferentially cite other academia-friendly journals, and non-profit journals likewise favor citations to non-profit sources. This asymmetry structurally reinforces the IF advantage of for-profit journals simply because they are dominant in the publishing system. To address this inequity, we propose a soft-power, low-risk approach of "strategic citation". By deliberately choosing to cite relevant articles from non-profit journals when multiple references would be equally valid, researchers can contribute to increasing those journals visibility and IF. This approach preserves scientific rigor and does not restrict publishing choices, but adds a layer of ethical intentionality to citation practices. Strategic citation offers a practical, actionable lever for researchers to promote a more balanced and ethical publishing system that complements broader structural reforms.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2025

Predicting the responses of the world's bird species to increases in agricultural production

The intensification and expansion of croplands are among the greatest threats to biodiversity, but the likely responses to these changes remain unknown for most species. Using data on responses of 862 bird species to changes in yields of arable crops, we extrapolate vulnerability to agriculture for the worlds other terrestrial birds based on their traits and taxonomy. We estimate that 74-78% of terrestrial bird species globally suffer population declines where natural habitats are replaced by croplands, and that over half cannot persist in cropland at even the lowest current yields. Past impacts of agriculture on birds have been greatest in the tropics, particularly in coastal forest regions of Central and South America and West Africa and in southern and South-East Asia. Using these estimates to model the impacts of future scenarios of agricultural change, we find that continuing current rates of cropland expansion and yield increases (i.e., extrapolating business-as-usual trends to 2050) is expected to have more negative impacts on birds (particularly in Central and South America, Eastern Europe, sub-Saharan Africa and South and East Asia) than a potential alternative of a targeted strategy of closing yield gaps while limiting cropland expansion. However, we also identify biodiverse regions of the world where closing yield gaps may have more severe impacts on birds than business-as-usual, such as the Pampas of South America and parts of the Sahel region in West Africa. The strategy of least impact for a particular area can be predicted from the response characteristics of the communities of species present there, offering opportunities to take account of regional context for designing less damaging global food production systems.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2023

Assessing the global prevalence of wild birds in trade

Trade represents a significant threat to many wild species and is often clandestine and poorly monitored. Information on which species are most prevalent in trade, and potentially threatened by it, therefore remains fragmentary. We mobilised seven global datasets on birds in trade to identify the species or groups of species that might be at particular risk. These datasets sample different parts of the broad trade spectrum but we nevertheless find a statistically strong congruence between them in which species are recorded in trade. Furthermore, the frequency with which species are recorded within datasets is positively correlated with their occurrence across datasets. This allows us to propose a trade prevalence score that can be applied to all bird species globally. This score discriminates well between species known from semi-independent assessments to be heavily or unsustainably traded and all other species. Globally, 45.1% of all bird species, and 36.7% of globally threatened bird species, were recorded in at least one of the seven datasets. Species listed in Appendices I or II of CITES, species with large geographical distributions and non-songbirds had higher trade prevalence scores. Speciose orders with high mean trade prevalence scores include the Falconiformes, Psittaciformes, Accipitriformes, Anseriformes, Bucerotiformes and Strigiformes. Despite their low mean prevalence score, Passeriformes accounted for the highest overall number of traded species of any order but had low representation in CITES Appendices. Geographical hotspots where large numbers of traded species co-occur differed between songbirds (South-East Asia and Eurasia) and non-songbirds (central South America, sub-Saharan Africa and India). This first attempt to quantify and map the relative prevalence in trade of all bird species globally can be used to identify species and groups of species which may be at particular risk of harm from trade and can inform conservation and policy interventions to reduce its adverse impacts. Article impact statementThe first metric to estimate the prevalence in trade of all the worlds bird species is presented.

ecology↗