"Wallace, together with Darwin was the founder of modern evolutionary theory, and when Darwin received Wallace's paper of 1858 (a year before the publication of the Origin of Species), he wrote to Lyell "All my originality, whatever it may amount to, will be smashed"."I never saw a more striking coincidence.Your words (referring to Lyell's earlier warnings that Darwin might be anticipated) have come true with a vengeance." In 1858 Wallace was already preparing an announcement of an importent zoogeographical discovery, which proposed a boundary line dividing the archipelago of Indo-Malayan and Australian zoological regions. The culmination of Wallace's approach was achieved in his monumental two-volume "The geographical Distribution." and it is a pioneer-work in zoogeography."--Abebooks website.

Terminology, conceptual overview, biogeography, modeling.

The Geographical Distribution of Animal Viral Diseases attempts to shed some light on the global distribution of 110 different viral diseases, mainly of livestock and companion animals. The world literature was screened for 110 different viruses, and maps were prepared. These maps delineate the global distribution of pathogenic viruses based on authenticated reports from a variety of reliable sources. Four viruses were categorized as affecting more than one species to a significant degree (astrovirus, rabies, rotaviruses, and Rift Valley fever). The largest number of maps involved viruses that affect humans. Of the 28 viruses a large number were from the California encephalitis group. Ten of the 28 viruses were reported only in the Eastern Hemisphere, 14 only in the Western Hemisphere, and four were worldwide. Birds were the next most frequently affected group with the 15 viruses, followed by pigs with 14 viruses. Overall the vector-borne viruses appear to have much sharper and clear-cut geographical boundaries than the others.

A synthesis of present understanding of the structure of the geographic ranges of species, which is a core issue in ecology and biogeography with implications for many of the environmental issues presently facing humankind.

This book brings together a set of approaches to the study of individual-species ecology based on the analysis of spatial variations of abundance. Distribution ecology assumes that ecological phenomena can be understood when analyzing the extrinsic (environmental) or intrinsic (physiological constraints, population mechanisms) that correlate with this spatial variation. Ecological processes depend on geographical scales, so their analysis requires following environmental heterogeneity. At small scales, the effects of biotic factors of ecosystems are strong, while at large scales, abiotic factors such as climate, govern ecological functioning. Responses of organisms also depend on scales: at small scales, adaptations dominate, i.e. the ability of organisms to respond adaptively using habitat decision rules that maximize their fitness; at large scales, limiting traits dominate, i.e., tolerance ranges to environmental conditions.​