These findings underscore why islands need urgent conservation efforts. Studying life-history traits can help predict and prevent future losses, before more species vanish unnoticed. Photo credit: #JavierMartínCarbajal 🧵 6/8

A striking example? Lotus gomerythus, a plant species that exhibited many of the traits associated with high extinction risk, went extinct in nature during our study’s publication process. Photo credit: #JavierMartínCarbajal 🧵 5/8

What drives extinction events? Key factors include: Invasive herbivores, island age, elevation, and human population pressure. Certain traits also increase extinction risk: Endemism, vertebrate pollination, nitrogen-fixation and zoochory (seed dispersal by animals) are among thse key traits 🧵 4/8

These figures of plant extinction are well above the expected global background extinction rate. Extinction patterns aren’t random. We detected a recent coastal extinction hotspot linked to socioeconomic changes since the 1960s, which have reshaped and treated island ecosystems 🧵 3/8

New Paper 🚨 Are species extinctions accelerating in the Anthropocene? And why are some species more at risk than others? Our latest research, published in @globalchangebio.bsky.social explores plant extinctions in Macaronesia, one of the world's most biodiverse island regions. A thread 🧵👇

Exciting milestone for the #iEcoEvoLab! Our first post celebrates the first PhD paper of #RaúlOrihuela-Rivero, congratulations for great work and leadership! Stay tuned for more on the paper and other lab updates in the coming days! @ipna.csic.es