MANY ecosystems face meltdown as global warming gathers pace. A new study suggests that fewer species than expected will become extinct—but they are set for a turbulent time as the ecosystems they live in become unrecognisable.
Conventional models of warming assume that most species and ecosystems will migrate gradually towards the poles or up mountainsides. “That is too simplistic,” says A. Townsend Peterson of the University of Kansas, who has investigated the likely effects in Mexico, a major centre of biological diversity. “The effects will be a lot more complicated, and often a lot more drastic.”
In reality, complex…
