Editing Ecology (section)

===Niche construction===
{{Main|Niche construction}}
{{See also|Ecosystem engineering}}

Organisms are subject to environmental pressures, but they also modify their habitats. The [[negative feedback|regulatory feedback]] between organisms and their environment can affect conditions from local (e.g., a [[beaver]] [[pond]]) to global scales, over time and even after death, such as decaying logs or [[silica]] skeleton deposits from marine organisms.<ref name="Hastings07"/> The process and concept of [[ecosystem engineering]] are related to [[niche construction]], but the former relates only to the physical modifications of the habitat whereas the latter also considers the evolutionary implications of physical changes to the environment and the feedback this causes on the process of natural selection. Ecosystem engineers are defined as: "organisms that directly or indirectly modulate the availability of resources to other species, by causing physical state changes in biotic or abiotic materials. In so doing they modify, maintain and create habitats."<ref name="Jones94"/>{{Rp|373}}

The ecosystem engineering concept has stimulated a new appreciation for the influence that organisms have on the ecosystem and evolutionary process. The term "niche construction" is more often used in reference to the under-appreciated feedback mechanisms of natural selection imparting forces on the abiotic niche.<ref name="Laland99"/><ref name="Write06"/> An example of natural selection through ecosystem engineering occurs in the nests of [[social insects]], including ants, bees, wasps, and termites. There is an emergent [[homeostasis]] or [[homeorhesis]] in the structure of the nest that regulates, maintains and defends the physiology of the entire colony. Termite mounds, for example, maintain a constant internal temperature through the design of air-conditioning chimneys. The structure of the nests themselves is subject to the forces of natural selection. Moreover, a nest can survive over successive generations, so that progeny inherit both genetic material and a legacy niche that was constructed before their time.<ref name="Odum05" /><ref name="Laland99"/><ref name="Hughes08"/>