Six percent loss of genetic variation in wild populations since the industrial revolution
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Genetic variation underpins population fitness and adaptive potential 1,2 . Thus it plays a key role in any species’ probability of long-term persistence, particularly under global climate change. Genetic variation can be lost in a single generation but its replenishment may take hundreds of generations 3 . For that reason safeguarding genetic variation is considered fundamental to maintaining biodiversity, and is an Aichi Target for 2020 4 . As human activities are driving declines in many wild populations 5 , genetic variation is also likely declining. However the magnitude of ongoing genetic variation loss has not been assessed, despite its importance. Here we show a 6% decline in within-population genetic variation of wild organisms since the industrial revolution. The erosion of genetic variation has been most severe for island species, with an 18% average decline. We also identified several key taxonomic and geographic information gaps that must be urgently addressed. Our results are consistent with single time-point meta-analyses that indicated genetic variation is likely declining 6,7 . However, our results represent the first confirmation of a global decline, and estimate of the magnitude of the genetic variation lost from wild populations.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.005 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".