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Ecosystem restoration, regeneration and rewilding

Guest Editors:
Carmel McDougall: University of St Andrews, Scotland
Nancy Shackelford: University of Victoria, Canada


BMC Ecology and Evolution called for submissions to our Collection on Ecosystem restoration, regeneration and rewilding. 

Intact and resilient ecosystems ensure a healthy and functioning planet, yet human actions are driving unprecedented environmental changes that burden the natural world. Worryingly, just 3% of the world's land is estimated to remain ecologically intact – a clear sign that scientific evidence is urgently needed to inform policies to restore and conserve ecosystems.

Meet the Guest Editors

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Carmel McDougall: University of St Andrews, Scotland

Dr. Carmel McDougall is a lecturer at the Scottish Oceans Institute, University of St Andrews, Scotland. With a background in molecular biology and aquaculture research, she became involved in shellfish reef restoration after stumbling across healthy oyster reefs in Australia while conducting a molecular survey of oyster biodiversity. Her research group uses comparative and functional genomics and experimental studies to provide practical outcomes for sustainable aquaculture and marine conservation, and to shed light on the evolution and diversity of the amazing repertoire of organisms found within our oceans.

Nancy Shackelford: University of Victoria, Canada

Dr. Nancy Shackleford is an Assistant Professor at the University of Victoria specializing in restoration research. She was born and raised in Texas, in traditional Jumano and Apache territory, but has been living in the Pacific Northwest, in the territories of the lək̓ʷəŋən and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples, for eight years. Her experience with restoration is diverse, from scrubby Texas woodlands, to Colorado grasslands, to cedar forests on our local coastline. She has an unshakeable love for data, knowledge, and leveraging shared work to enhance restoration outcomes. She gravitates towards terrestrial restoration in experimental and observational science, but is continually expanding her integration of the social dimensions of restoration.

About the collection

BMC Ecology and Evolution called for submissions to our Collection on Ecosystem restoration, regeneration and rewilding.

Intact and resilient ecosystems ensure a healthy and functioning planet, yet human actions are driving unprecedented environmental changes that burden the natural world. Worryingly, just 3% of the world's land is estimated to remain ecologically intact – a clear sign that scientific evidence is urgently needed to inform policies to restore and conserve ecosystems. 

Preventing, halting, and reversing the loss of nature is now being prioritized globally, with the United Nations General Assembly declaring 2021-2030 as the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. In support of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 6: Clean water and sanitation, 13: Climate action, 14: Life below water and 15: Life on land, BMC Ecology and Evolution welcomes research on the design, application, optimization, management, and outcomes of restoration and rewilding projects in terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems.

Image credit: Saipg / Getty Images / iStock

  1. Shellfish reef restoration is relatively new in Australia, particularly to intertidal estuarine environments. In late 2019/early 2020 the first large-scale shellfish reef restoration project of the Sydney rock...

    Authors: Victoria J Cole, David Harasti, S Kirk Dahle and Kylie Russell
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:114
    Content type: Research Published on:

  2. Artificial linear landscape elements, including roads, pipelines, and drainage channels, are main sources of global habitat fragmentation. Restoration of natural habitats on unused linear landscape elements ca...

    Authors: Orsolya Valkó, András Kelemen, Orsolya Kiss, Zoltán Bátori, Réka Kiss and Balázs Deák
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:112
    Content type: Research Published on:

  4. The ecology and biology of oysters (Ostreidae) across the tropics is poorly understood. Morphological plasticity and shared characteristics among oysters have resulted in the misidentification of species, crea...

    Authors: Marina A. Richardson, Nikolina Nenadic, Max Wingfield and Carmel McDougall
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:67
    Content type: Research Published on:

  5. Reintroduction represents an effective strategy for the conservation of endangered wildlife, yet it might inadvertently impact the native ecosystems. This investigation assesses the impact of reintroducing end...

    Authors: Yu Zhang, Jiawei Liu, Ke Zhang, Anqi Wang, Duishan Sailikebieke, Zexin Zhang, Tegen Ao, Liping Yan, Dong Zhang, Kai Li and Heqing Huang
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:61
    Content type: Research Published on:

  6. Land uses such as crop production, livestock grazing, mining, and urban development have contributed to degradation of drylands worldwide. Loss of big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) on disturbed drylands across...

    Authors: Elizabeth C. Bailey, Eric Thacker, Thomas A. Monaco and Kari E. Veblen
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:50
    Content type: Research Published on:

  7. Ecosystem Services Value (ESV) are the various beneficial functions and products that natural ecosystems provide to humans, and are important indicators for evaluating ecosystem conditions and human well-being...

    Authors: Qinyu Wu, Liya Yang and Jiaxin Mi
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2024 24:28
    Content type: Research Published on:

  8. Anthropomorphic activities have caused major damage to ecosystems worldwide. Although documenting this damage is important, implementing measures to halt and reverse ecosystem decline is critical and is now be...

    Authors: Nancy Shackelford and Carmel McDougall
    Citation: BMC Ecology and Evolution 2023 23:52
    Content type: Editorial Published on:

Submission Guidelines

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This Collection welcomes submission of original Research Articles. Should you wish to submit a different article type, please read our submission guidelines to confirm that type is accepted by the journal. Articles for this Collection should be submitted via our submission system, Snapp. During the submission process you will be asked whether you are submitting to a Collection, please select "Ecosystem restoration, regeneration and rewilding" from the dropdown menu.

Articles will undergo the journal’s standard peer-review process and are subject to all of the journal’s standard policies. Articles will be added to the Collection as they are published.

The Guest Editors have no competing interests with the submissions which they handle through the peer review process. The peer review of any submissions for which the Guest Editors have competing interests is handled by another Editorial Board Member who has no competing interests.