Global Ecology And Biogeography

Global Ecology and Biogeography (global-ecology-and-biogeography)

Journal positioning

Global Ecology and Biogeography is a Wiley journal and a leading venue for macroecology and biogeography. Its defining character is scale: it publishes work on global or large-scale patterns of biodiversity and the processes that generate them, where the spatial extent, the analytical approach, and the biological inference jointly carry the contribution. The journal rewards papers that document, explain, or predict broad-scale patterns — species-richness gradients, range dynamics, functional and phylogenetic structure across continents or the globe — and that advance macroecological theory rather than reporting local or site-specific results. Strong spatial-analytical rigor is expected, with explicit attention to the statistical artifacts that arise at macro scales. Readership is the macroecology and biogeography community plus broad-scale conservation and global-change ecologists. This skill is a fit / venue-selection / re-framing tool. It does not replace the journal's current official submission guidelines. Before submitting, re-check the live author instructions on the GEB Wiley site.

When to trigger

• The author names GEB as the target for a macroecological or biogeographic study of global or large-scale patterns of biodiversity.
• A manuscript documents or explains a broad-scale pattern using spatial analyses, and the author is choosing between GEB, Journal of Biogeography, Ecography, and Ecology Letters.
• A paper tests or extends macroecological theory — diversity gradients, range-size rules, body-size patterns, scaling laws — across large spatial extents.
• The author needs GEB's scale, rigor, and spatial-statistics expectations, plus desk-reject criteria, before submission.

Scope & topic fit

• Large-scale biodiversity patterns: latitudinal and elevational richness gradients, beta-diversity across regions, functional and phylogenetic diversity mapped at continental-to-global extent.
• Biogeographic processes: range dynamics, dispersal and historical biogeography, niche conservatism, and the assembly of regional biotas at broad scales.
• Macroecological theory and laws: species–area and species–energy relationships, metabolic and body-size scaling, abundance–occupancy and range-size frequency distributions.
• Global-change macroecology: large-scale responses of distributions, diversity, or traits to climate and land-use change, including range shifts and future projections.
• Spatial and macroecological methods: new approaches to broad-scale inference, sampling-bias correction, spatial autocorrelation handling, or biodiversity modeling that enable continental-to-global analyses.
• Trait, functional, and phylogenetic biogeography where the cross-system or global signal — not a single site — is the contribution.

Method & evidence bar

• The spatial extent must be genuinely large-scale; local or single-region studies need a strong argument that the result is macroecologically general.
• Spatial-statistical rigor is mandatory: spatial autocorrelation must be addressed explicitly, and inference must be robust to it.
• Sampling bias, uneven survey effort, and data completeness must be assessed and corrected; macroecological conclusions drawn from biased occurrence data without correction are not defensible.
• Analyses must use appropriate models for broad-scale data — mixed/hierarchical, spatial, or phylogenetic methods as relevant — with effect sizes and uncertainty reported, not p-values alone.
• The biological interpretation must connect the documented pattern to macroecological or biogeographic process; pattern description without a process-level advance is insufficient.
• Data and code must be deposited in a public repository (Dryad, Zenodo, figshare, or equivalent), and broad-scale datasets must be reproducibly sourced.

Structure & house style

• GEB uses standard research-article structure (Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion) with structured-abstract conventions; re-check the current abstract format and word limits on the live site.
• The Methods must document spatial extent, grain, projection, data sources, and the spatial/statistical treatment in enough detail to reproduce a macroecological analysis.
• Maps and large-scale figures are central; projection, resolution, and color scales must be chosen so that the broad-scale pattern is legible and not misleading.
• The Introduction frames the question in macroecological/biogeographic theory; broad-scale generality, not local novelty, is the selling point.
• Supporting Information carries sensitivity analyses, alternative spatial models, data-source details, and supplementary maps.
• Writing should foreground the pattern–process link and the scale of inference from the abstract onward.

Official-submission checklist

• Before giving submission-ready advice, read ../../resources/source-basis.md and ../../resources/official-source-map.md; start from the official source anchors for this journal family, then cite the current journal-specific page you checked.
• Search the live site for "Global Ecology and Biogeography author guidelines" and follow the current Wiley version.
• Re-check article types (Research Paper, Macroecological Methods, Research Review, etc.) and their word, abstract, and figure limits; confirm the current structured-abstract format.
• Re-check data-availability and code-availability requirements; confirm accepted repositories and expectations for archiving broad-scale spatial datasets.
• Re-check competing-interests, funding, and AI-use disclosure requirements; confirm preprint policy (bioRxiv/EcoEvoRxiv posting is generally compatible).
• If the live official instructions conflict with this skill, the official instructions win.

Pre-submission self-check

• One sentence — the large-scale pattern or macroecological process advanced, and the spatial extent at which it holds.
• The study is genuinely macroscale; if the inference is local or single-region, a narrower-scope journal is more appropriate.
• Spatial autocorrelation and sampling bias are explicitly addressed, with appropriate spatial/hierarchical/phylogenetic models.
• The pattern is connected to a process-level interpretation, not described in isolation.
• Maps and figures use defensible projections and resolution and convey the broad-scale signal clearly.
• Data and code are deposited in a public repository; broad-scale data sources are documented and reproducible.

Common desk-reject triggers

• A local or single-site study whose results are not credibly generalizable to macroecological scale.
• A broad-scale analysis that ignores spatial autocorrelation or draws conclusions from uncorrected, biased occurrence data.
• A purely descriptive distribution map or species list without a macroecological or biogeographic process-level advance.
• A single-species or single-region species-distribution model presented without large-scale theoretical contribution.
• A paper that exceeds limits or omits the structured abstract, data-availability statement, or required spatial-methods detail.

Re-routing decision

• Shorter, more conceptual ecological advance with brevity at a premium: ecology-letters.
• Narrower biogeographic scope, regional patterns, or historical biogeography of particular taxa/regions: Journal of Biogeography (journal-of-biogeography).
• Macroecological or spatial-ecology study with a strong methods/analytical focus at intermediate scope: Ecography.
• Broad original research or research-backed review at higher impact across ecology and evolution: nature-ecology-and-evolution.

Output format

[Fit] High / Medium / Low (one-line reason)
[Target] Global Ecology and Biogeography
[Topic tags] <2–3 closest topics>
[Method/evidence] <is the inference genuinely macroscale, with spatial-autocorrelation and sampling-bias handling, and a pattern-to-process advance?>
[Top risk] <the single most likely reason for rejection>
[Official items to re-check] <article-type/abstract limits / spatial-methods detail / data-code deposition / disclosure / preprint policy>
[Re-route suggestion] <if not a fit, a better-matched venue>