Introduction to the BES Virtual Issue: Methods in Ecology and Evolution
 

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 advances 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 enormous: arguably the rate of research is driven by changes in the methods and technology available. It is therefore surprising that no single publication dedicated to advances in methods has existed until now.

For those conducting research, methodology is an important everyday concern: statistics, molecular methods and survey techniques are all present basic considerations that have to be thought about at all stages of research from the initial project planning through to publication. Evolution and Ecology are hybrid disciplines, and any single study can find itself drawing on several techniques from any of maths, statistics, chemistry, molecular biology, GIS, or phylogenetics (this list is not exhaustive). Currently, papers describing methods that are relevant to Ecology and Evolution are published in any of 10-20 journals. This makes the literature difficult to follow and developments may take time to filter through to end-users. As an example of this, AIC-IT methods have become very widely used in the ecological literature. However, the origins of these methods were published in journals that were probably rather obscure for many readers and the methods took some time to make their way through to the ecological community as a whole.

For nearly 100 years the British Ecological Society has been at the forefront of publishing ecological research, as well as identifying the need for new publications to serve the ecological community. The origin of Methods in Ecology and Evolution lies in the recognition that methodological papers are extremely important, of interest to ecologists and evolutionary biologists alike, and that a distinct niche existed for a publication devoted to methodological advances. Here we mark the launch of Methods in Ecology and Evolution by bringing together papers recently published in the British Ecological Society’s four already established journals. These papers encompass a range of methodological studies. In doing so we hope to highlight the range of types of methodological paper that our new journal will publish in the future: these include papers in diverse areas such as statistics, stable isotope methods, spatial analysis, as well as methods used in broad areas such as evolutionary ecology, community ecology and in applied and conservation ecology.

This list is by no means exhaustive however: we also will welcome papers in evolutionary biology, phylogenetics and inter-disciplinary methods, for instance, which are subject areas that are not currently widely covered by the British Ecological Society journals, but are of great interest to the wider audience of ecologists and evolutionary biologists. We welcome enquiries by prospective authors as well as suggestions for improvements and enhancements that authors and readers would like to see.

R.P. Freckleton, Editor, Methods in Ecology and Evolution

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