About this Research Topic

Background

Plant invasiveness is a globally recognized environmental and economical problem. The introduction of invasive alien species can result from accidental, unintentional, or most usually planned import as a trade product on the horticultural market. The largest number of invasive alien species is introduced as ornamental species, through garden centers, nurseries, and botanical gardens. Due to high marketing pressure by sellers or demand by customers, those species rapidly became prevalent in a considerable number of yards, green and open spaces. Being very adaptive, fast-growing, and at the same time highly ornamental, those species provide numerous ecosystem services. However, invasive species also spread rapidly, damage natural areas, alter ecosystem processes, displace native species, hybridize with natives, and support other potentially damaging plants, animals, and pathogens. If viewed exclusively as ‘weeds’ then many resources would be invested in the eradication measures of invasive alien species, with little certainty about the desired outcome. Thus, this Research Topic aims to gather recent findings from around the world, providing insight into ecosystem services and disservices provided by the invasive alien species further processing into the green solutions, instead of eradication.

Greenery and its potential green products should be viewed as a source of capital that we have borrowed from nature and which we should leave to our descendants as an inheritance, instead of wasting it by inappropriate maintenance. Research covering the utilization of invasive alien species in innovation opportunities – nature-based solutions (biopesticides, biofuels and similar) - are more than needed. In order to fully understand their adaptive mechanisms and potentials this Research Topic welcomes papers dealing with molecular approaches, genetics, ecophysiology, social and economic assessments.

We invite manuscripts (original research papers, reviews, opinions, modelling approaches and methods) covering the following aspects related to invasive plants:

• Biodiversity disturbance
• Ecosystem services and disservices
• Adaptation mechanisms from cellular level to the entire organism
• Ecophysiology of invasive plant species
• Biopesticides
• Bioliquids
• Invasions modeling
• Economical assessments of services and disservices
• Management of invasive flora

Keywords: invasive plants, invasive alien species, plant invasiveness, ornamental plant, sustainability

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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