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Methods in Ecology and Evolution

2010; Wiley; Volume: 1; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1111/j.2041-210x.2010.00016.x

2041-210X

Robert P. Freckleton, Graziella Iossa,

Plant and animal studies

The development of new methods can be instrumental in opening up new lines of research in ecology and evolution. With the development of new methods it is possible to answer questions that were not previously tractable and, in many areas, progress has been made largely through the development of new methods. Methods in Ecology and Evolution has been founded with the goal of providing a single source for methodological developments in ecological and evolutionary research. One of the reasons for launching this journal is that new methods appeal to a broad range of users, not restricted to one discipline or sub-discipline. This new journal will be a valuable focus for both readers and authors. The technology that is available to biologists has changed out of almost all recognition in the past 50 years or so. The availability of computers, molecular and genetic tools, as well as the ability to travel widely between continents, are all changes in technology that have occurred within a relatively short space of time. The impact this has had on the practice of ecological and evolutionary research is profound, and ecological and evolutionary research has changed out of all recognition in just the last 20 years. Methods in Ecology and Evolution is intended to provide a new platform for those developing methods and for users and practitioners to be able to follow developments from a single source. For those conducting research an important concern is methodology: statistics, molecular methods, survey techniques all present basic considerations that have to be thought about at all stages from the initial project planning through to analysis and publication. Evolution and Ecology are hybrid disciplines, and any single study can find itself drawing several techniques from, for example, mathematics, statistics, chemistry, molecular biology, Geographical Information Systems (GIS) or phylogenetics (this list is not exhaustive). Currently, methods papers relevant to Ecology and Evolution are published in any of 10–20 publications. This makes the literature difficult to follow and developments may take time to filter through to end-users. As an example, Bayesian methods and Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) have now slowly permeated the literature, but the slow advance of this progress can be traced. Statisticians developed these methods in the mid-1990s, and phylogeneticists were using them by the late 1990s. However, it is only in the past 10 years that ecologists have begun routinely to use these approaches. This highlights an important property of methodological papers: although some methods are quite specific to a given system, problem or species, in many cases methods are applicable throughout ecology and evolution and are not taxonomically restricted in their applicability. Methods published in the evolutionary literature are frequently used by ecologists (e.g. the comparative method) and vice versa (Akaike's Information Criterion-Information Theoretic (AIC-IT) methods of model selection are now used by evolutionary biologists, but were developed by ecologists). For those publishing methods papers, the best place to publish is not in a specialized journal, but a broad one; however, until now such a journal did not exist. The existing four journals of the British Ecological Society (Functional Ecology, Journal of Ecology, Journal of Animal Ecology and Journal of Applied Ecology) are internationally recognized leading journals in the field of ecology. These have been successful in publishing in all areas of ecology, including field experiments, long-term studies, theory as well as methods. The history of the journals has been that new titles have been added to the family as it is perceived that new niches for publishing open up: so, following the establishment of Journal of Ecology in 1912, the Journal of Animal Ecology was added in 1932, the Journal of Applied Ecology in 1960 and Functional Ecology in 1990. Methods in Ecology and Evolution is a natural addition to this family. The other journals have long histories of publication in population, community and physiological ecology, as well as in the application of ecological principles to real-world problems. Although all of the society’s journals have published methodological papers in the past, our new journal now formalizes the coverage of this important area. Methods in Ecology and Evolution will promote the development of new methods in ecology & evolution, and facilitate their dissemination and uptake by the research community. Methods in Ecology and Evolution will bring together papers from previously disparate sub-disciplines to provide a single forum for tracking methodological developments in all areas. Papers will be rigorously peer-reviewed to ensure the highest possible quality. We intend the scope of the journal to be broad. An indicative (but not exhaustive) list of areas in which we hope to publish includes: statistical methods field methods computational tools analytical tools phylogenetics Our editorial board (see http://www.methodsinecologyandevolution.org/view/0/editorialBoard.html and http://www.methodsinecologyandevolution.org/view/0/editorialprofiles.html) has been chosen to reflect the areas in which we hope to see submissions, as well as to reflect the scope of papers that have been submitted to us. We will grow this board and extend the expertise to reflect the areas in which we receive submissions as well as areas of development of new methods. A prime aim of the journal will be to maximize the uptake of techniques by the community: we will therefore emphasize the need for making techniques readily available for instance, where appropriate, by linking to computer code and software with the use of example data and tutorials. We will encourage authors to make their techniques understandable and to provide the tools to enable readers to implement these new methods. In addition to the publication of high-quality peer-reviewed papers the journal will also: produce video-casts with authors, explaining and demonstrating their methods; host user-generated videos on methods and example applications; provide links to software as well as to tutorials and documentation; host a correspondence site for the discussion of methods and papers, and developments arising from the papers published in the journal. These methods of communication are under-used at present; however, they are becoming increasingly common and routine, and for a journal such as ours are an ideal way to link users with new tools. Methods in Ecology and Evolution has a regularly updated blog (http://methodsblog.wordpress.com/), as well as a correspondence site (http://www.respond2articles.com/MEE/), and pages on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Methods-in-Ecology-and-Evolution/) and Twitter (http://twitter.com/MethodsEcolEvol). We will update these with news of new papers as soon as they are accepted and as they go online, as well as other journal information, such as where you can meet us at conferences. The correspondence site includes a section for suggestions of how we may develop and improve the journal and we will be glad to hear from authors and readers.