Although research on human-mediated exchanges of species has substantially intensified during the last centuries, we know surprisingly little about temporal dynamics of alien species accumulations across regions and taxa. Using a novel database of 45,813 first records of 16,926 established alien species, we show that the annual rate of first records worldwide has increased during the last 200 years, with 37% of all first records reported most recently (1970-2014). Inter-continental and inter-taxonomic variation can be largely attributed to the diaspora of European settlers in the nineteenth century and to the acceleration in trade in the twentieth century. For all taxonomic groups, the increase in numbers of alien species does not show any sign of saturation and most taxa even show increases in the rate of first records over time. This highlights that past efforts to mitigate invasions have not been effective enough to keep up with increasing globalization.
BT - Nature Communications LA - eng N1 - Seebens, Hanno Blackburn, Tim M. Dyer, Ellie E. Genovesi, Piero Hulme, Philip E. Jeschke, Jonathan M. Pagad, Shyama Pysek, Petr Winter, Marten Arianoutsou, Margarita Bacher, Sven Blasius, Bernd Brundu, Giuseppe Capinha, Cesar Celesti-Grapow, Laura Dawson, Wayne Dullinger, Stefan Fuentes, Nicol Jaeger, Heinke Kartesz, John Kenis, Marc Kreft, Holger Kuehn, Ingolf Lenzner, Bernd Liebhold, Andrew Mosena, Alexander Moser, Dietmar Nishino, Misako Pearman, David Pergl, Jan Rabitsch, Wolfgang Rojas-Sandoval, Julissa Roques, Alain Rorke, Stephanie Rossinelli, Silvia Roy, Helen E. Scalera, Riccardo Schindler, Stefan Stajerova, Katerina Tokarska-Guzik, Barbara van Kleunen, Mark Walker, Kevin Weigelt, Patrick Yamanaka, Takehiko Essl, Franz N2 -Although research on human-mediated exchanges of species has substantially intensified during the last centuries, we know surprisingly little about temporal dynamics of alien species accumulations across regions and taxa. Using a novel database of 45,813 first records of 16,926 established alien species, we show that the annual rate of first records worldwide has increased during the last 200 years, with 37% of all first records reported most recently (1970-2014). Inter-continental and inter-taxonomic variation can be largely attributed to the diaspora of European settlers in the nineteenth century and to the acceleration in trade in the twentieth century. For all taxonomic groups, the increase in numbers of alien species does not show any sign of saturation and most taxa even show increases in the rate of first records over time. This highlights that past efforts to mitigate invasions have not been effective enough to keep up with increasing globalization.
PY - 2017 T2 - Nature Communications TI - No saturation in the accumulation of alien species worldwide VL - 8 ER -