The World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic on 11 March 2020. The ‘anthropause’ almost emptied our streets of vehicles. In urban areas, automobile traffic is a major environmental factor, and tardigrades can serve as bioindicators of environmental change. During the winter of 2019–2020, samples were taken both before and during the COVID-19 lockdown. In both cases, traffic variables (vehicles per minute), environmental variables, and microhabitats were evaluated. Both before and after the COVID-19 lockdown, the true species diversity and the β-diversity of each habitat and habitat pair were compared. The indicator value method identified species that served as indicators of habitat. Although species richness increased during the anthropause, abundance decreased, as evidenced by the discovery of previously unknown species of Paramacrobiotus and Milnesium in 2020 and by the first record of Mesobiotus in the same year. Different variables were affected in different ways by the decline in vehicular traffic that occurred during the anthropause. Compared to the other examined traffic conditions, the behaviour of the variables was distinct in medium traffic, resulting in more stable conditions. Patterns of nested urban diversity might produce reversible gradients over time. Between habitats with high vehicular traffic and those with medium vehicular traffic, the greatest loss of species occurs.

中文翻译：

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阿根廷萨尔塔 COVID-19 大流行限制期间缓步动物城市社区的人类更年期

世界卫生组织于 2020 年 3 月 11 日宣布 COVID-19 为大流行病。“人类更年期”几乎清空了我们街道上的车辆。在城市地区，汽车交通是一个主要的环境因素，缓步动物可以作为环境变化的生物指标。2019 年至 2020 年冬季，我们在 COVID-19 封锁之前和封锁期间采集了样本。在这两种情况下，都评估了交通变量（每分钟车辆数）、环境变量和微生境。在 COVID-19 封锁之前和之后，对每个栖息地和栖息地对的真实物种多样性和 β 多样性进行了比较。指标值方法确定了作为栖息地指标的物种。尽管人类更年期物种丰富度有所增加，但丰度却有所下降，2020 年发现了以前未知的 Paramacrobiotus 和 Milnesium 物种以及同年首次记录的 Mesobiotus 就证明了这一点。不同的变量以不同的方式受到人类更年期车辆交通量下降的影响。与其他检查的交通条件相比，变量的行为在中等交通中是不同的，从而导致更稳定的条件。随着时间的推移，嵌套的城市多样性模式可能会产生可逆的梯度。在车辆交通量较高的栖息地和车辆交通量中等的栖息地之间，物种损失最为严重。