Article
Biology
Patrick L. Thompson, Sonia Kefi, Yuval R. Zelnik, Laura E. Dee, Shaopeng Wang, Claire de Mazancourt, Michel Loreau, Andrew Gonzalez
Summary: The study used a Lotka-Volterra competition model to simulate the scale dependence of biodiversity and ecosystem functioning, finding that more biodiversity is required to maintain functioning at larger spatial and temporal scales, with the autocorrelation of environmental heterogeneity influencing the rate at which the number of species needed increases.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
(2021)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Samuel E. Wuest, Lukas Schulz, Surbhi Rana, Julia Frommelt, Merten Ehmig, Nuno D. Pires, Ueli Grossniklaus, Christian S. Hardtke, Ulrich Z. Hammes, Bernhard Schmid, Pascal A. Niklaus
Summary: In plant communities, the positive diversity effects are often attributed to complementary niches occupied by different species or genotypes. However, the specific nature of niche complementarity, including how it is expressed in terms of trait differences between plants, remains unclear.
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
(2023)
Article
Soil Science
Apolline Auclerc, Lea Beaumelle, Sandra Barantal, Matthieu Chauvat, Jerome Corte, Tania De Almeida, Anne-Maimiti Dulaurentg, Thierry Dutoit, Sophie Joimel, Geoffroy Sere, Olivier Blight
Summary: Ecological engineering in degraded ecosystems often manipulates plants and soil biota for restoration. However, soil invertebrates have been underused in restoration efforts, despite their important role in soil ecological processes and plant-soil feedback. This review highlights the potential of using soil invertebrate functional traits for ecosystem restoration, focusing on traits related to nutrient and carbon cycling, pollutant detoxification, soil structure arrangement, and biological control. The paper proposes guidelines for integrating soil organism traits into ecological engineering and identifies knowledge gaps and limitations.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Iryna Dronova, Sophie Taddeo, Kendall Harris
Summary: Plant diversity may have a negative impact on the phenological stability of wetlands and other systems, which can be measured using satellite-derived indicators. The study found that plant diversity was negatively associated with interannual phenological variability and that it explained more variability than stability indicators used in previous studies. Path analysis suggested that phenological variability could mediate the relationship between plant diversity and stability.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Jakob Runge
Summary: Detecting and quantifying causal relations in ecosystem functioning is challenging and involves reasoning about underlying assumptions. A global study on grasslands highlights the importance of considering confounding, nonlinearity, and determinism in modern causal inference approaches in ecology.
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
(2023)
Article
Plant Sciences
Ying Yan, John Connolly, Maowei Liang, Lin Jiang, Shaopeng Wang
Summary: This study developed an integrated framework to explore the linkages between biodiversity effects on ecosystem functioning and stability. It found that higher community productivity was mainly due to complementarity effects (CE), while higher community stability was mainly due to species asynchrony. The structural equation model illustrated how species evenness mediated the relationship between the various mechanisms.
JOURNAL OF ECOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Ecology
Alexander Feckler, Jacob Schnurr, Gabriela Kalcikova, Amelie Truchy, Brendan G. McKie, Ralf B. Schaefer, Ralf Schulz, Mirco Bundschuh
Summary: Leaf litter decomposition is an important ecosystem process in streams, and its efficiency is affected by leaf litter diversity, agricultural intensity, habitat characteristics, water quality, and invertebrate composition. The study found that increasing agricultural intensity weakens the biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationship, which could threaten carbon cycling and food web integrity in streams.
Article
Plant Sciences
C. Fahey, W. C. Parker, A. Paquette, C. Messier, P. M. Antunes
Summary: This study found that there is a strong relationship between plant diversity and productivity, which is mediated by soil fungi through various mechanisms such as altered resource partitioning, facilitation via fungal networks, and biotic feedbacks. This relationship is context dependent and influenced by resource availability.
JOURNAL OF ECOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Alejandro Berlinches de Gea, Yann Hautier, Stefan Geisen
Summary: Biodiversity, both aboveground and belowground, is negatively affected by global changes such as drought or warming. This article highlights the need to understand the relationship between soil biodiversity and ecosystem functioning under the influence of interactive global change drivers. The results from scarce studies studying interactive effects range from antagonistic to additive to synergistic, indicating the importance of quantitatively accounting for the impacts of interactive global change drivers on soil biodiversity and ecosystem functioning relationships.
GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Agronomy
Ye Su, Rui-Peng Yu, Hua-Sen Xu, Jian-Hao Sun, Jian-Hua Zhao, Wei-Ping Zhang, Hao Yang, Surigaoge Surigaoge, Ragan M. Callaway, Long Li
Summary: Crop cultivar mixtures can increase and stabilize productivity, but their effects on year-to-year temporal stability vary. This inconsistency is due to unclear mechanisms underlying the effects of diversity on stability, and the role of abiotic environment on crop mixtures is not well understood.
FIELD CROPS RESEARCH
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Laura J. Williams, Ethan E. Butler, Jeannine Cavender-Bares, Artur Stefanski, Karen E. Rice, Christian Messier, Alain Paquette, Peter B. Reich
Summary: The study found that in mixed-species communities, species with higher light interception and light use efficiency are more likely to exhibit greater productivity compared to monocultures.
Article
Ecology
Megan Fitzgerald, Karla Gonzalez, Jennifer L. Funk, Christine R. Whitcraft, Bengt J. Allen
Summary: This study confirms that incorporating biodiversity into restoration designs can enhance ecosystem function, and the positive effects of diversity on ecosystem functions will strengthen over time. The results demonstrate that complementarity becomes more important post-restoration compared to selection effects, contributing to higher productivity.
Article
Microbiology
Bo Wu, Xiaotong Guan, Ting Deng, Xueqin Yang, Juan Li, Min Zhou, Cheng Wang, Shanquan Wang, Qingyun Yan, Longfei Shu, Qiang He, Zhili He
Summary: Biodiversity is crucial for ecosystem functions and services. While there have been many studies on biodiversity-ecosystem functioning (BEF) relationships in plant and animal systems, it remains unclear if such a relationship exists and how it evolves in microbial systems. In this study, synthetic denitrifying communities (SDCs) were constructed using 12 Shewanella denitrifiers with varying species richness. The results showed a positive correlation between community richness and functions, but this correlation was only significant in earlier stages of the evolution experiment. Additionally, community functions generally increased throughout the experiment, with lower richness communities showing greater increases and positive BEF relationships largely attributable to complementary effects.
MICROBIOLOGY SPECTRUM
(2023)
Article
Plant Sciences
Manuel Walde, Eric Allan, Seraina L. Cappelli, Margaux Didion-Gency, Arthur Gessler, Marco M. Lehmann, Noemie A. Pichon, Charlotte Grossiord
Summary: Research shows that biodiversity promotes ecosystem functioning and stability, with the effects varying based on resource availability. High species richness in temperate grasslands can enhance productivity and reduce negative impacts of drought events. Factors such as species richness, functional composition, and water use efficiency play important roles in driving enhanced ecosystem functioning in biodiverse grasslands.
JOURNAL OF ECOLOGY
(2021)
Review
Ecology
Fons van der Plas, Justus Hennecke, Jonathan M. Chase, Jasper van Ruijven, Kathryn E. Barry
Summary: Widespread evidence suggests that the loss of local species richness (a-diversity) hampers biomass production and ecosystem stability. However, studies on the impact of 3-diversity (variation in species compositions among ecological communities) on ecosystem functioning have produced mixed results. To better understand the importance of 3-diversity, it is necessary to consider it in different contexts. By examining three scenarios that create gradients in 3-diversity, namely changes in abiotic heterogeneity, habitat isolation, and species pool richness, it is demonstrated that there are not universally positive relationships between 3-diversity, production, and ecosystem stability. Nevertheless, predictable relationships exist in specific contexts, which can reconcile seemingly contrasting empirical relationships.
TRENDS IN ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Yuxin Chen, Anja Vogel, Cameron Wagg, Tianyang Xu, Maitane Iturrate-Garcia, Michael Scherer-Lorenzen, Alexandra Weigelt, Nico Eisenhauer, Bernhard Schmid
Summary: This study finds that communities exposed to recurrent extreme climatic events can accelerate recovery from subsequent droughts by enhancing niche complementarity between species. This transgenerational effect may enhance the sustainability of biodiversity and ecosystem functioning in a future with more frequent droughts.
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
(2022)
Article
Ecology
Luke Browne, Lars Markesteijn, Eric Manzane-Pinzon, S. Joseph Wright, Robert Bagchi, Bettina M. J. Engelbrecht, F. Andrew Jones, Liza S. Comita
Summary: The relationship between functional traits and performance is often weak or uncertain, especially for plants. This study examined the trait-rate relationships for six functional traits in woody plants across eight forest sites in Panama. The results showed widespread variation in the strength of trait-rate relationships across sites, with some variations explained by soil phosphorus availability.
FUNCTIONAL ECOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Will Barker, Liza S. S. Comita, S. Joseph Wright, Oliver L. L. Phillips, Brian E. E. Sedio, Sarah A. A. Batterman
Summary: The study shows that herbivory may be sufficient to limit symbiotic nitrogen fixation in tropical forests and could constrain its role in alleviating nitrogen limitation on the tropical carbon sink.
Article
Plant Sciences
Kenneth J. J. Davidson, Julien Lamour, Alistair Rogers, Kim S. S. Ely, Qianyu Li, Nate G. G. McDowell, Alexandria L. L. Pivovaroff, Brett T. T. Wolfe, S. Joseph Wright, Alfonso Zambrano, Shawn P. P. Serbin
Summary: Understanding the mechanisms of stomatal regulation of transpiration and CO2 assimilation is crucial for predicting the response of terrestrial ecosystems to global change. A study was conducted on six tropical broadleaf evergreen tree species to evaluate the estimation of g(1) and g(0) parameters. The results showed uncertainties in the physiological and mechanistic controls on these parameters. Improving the accuracy of modeled stomatal conductance can be achieved by considering the diurnal variation and measurement approaches of stomatal behavior.
Article
Ecology
Damie Pak, Varun Swamy, Patricia Alvarez-Loayza, Fernando Cornejo-Valverde, Simon A. Queenborough, Margaret R. Metz, John Terborgh, Renato Valencia, S. Joseph Wright, Nancy C. Garwood, Jesse R. Lasky
Summary: The study found that seed fall phenology in tropical plant communities exhibits significant synchrony and is influenced by shared environmental responses and positive interactions among species. Within species groups, both compensatory and synchronous phenology were observed. Wind-dispersed species showed significant synchrony at a scale of approximately 6 months, suggesting shared phenological niches to match seasonal wind patterns.
Editorial Material
Ecology
Peter H. H. Thrall, Jonathan Chase, John Drake, Nathalie Espuno, Stephane Hello, Vanessa Ezenwa, Barbara Han, Akira Mori, Helene Muller-Landau
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Edwin Lebrija-Trejos, Andres Hernandez, S. Joseph Wright
Summary: Tropical tree diversity increases with rainfall, potentially due to direct physiological effects of moisture availability and indirect effects mediated by biotic interactions. This study in central Panama evaluated the relationships between interannual variation in moisture availability, density-dependent interactions, and seedling diversity. It found that diversity increased with soil moisture, and this effect persisted for at least 15 years. Negative density-dependent interactions among conspecifics in wetter years contributed to the observed increase in diversity, suggesting an indirect enhancement of diversity through moisture-sensitive interactions. Pathogens and phytophagous insects, many of which are moisture-sensitive, mediate seedling interactions in tropical forests, and changes in moisture availability may impact these interactions and tree diversity.
Article
Plant Sciences
Julien Lamour, Kenneth J. Davidson, Kim S. Ely, Gilles Le Moguedec, Jeremiah A. Anderson, Qianyu Li, Osvaldo Calderon, Charles D. Koven, S. Joseph Wright, Anthony P. Walker, Shawn P. Serbin, Alistair Rogers
Summary: This study compared the representation of vertical gradients of key leaf traits in terrestrial biosphere models (TBMs) with measurements in a tropical forest, and quantified the impact of these gradients on simulated canopy-scale CO2 and water fluxes. The comparison showed divergence between the observed and modeled trait gradients, which influenced canopy-scale simulations of water vapor and CO2 exchange. The study suggests that current assumptions about leaf trait gradients in TBMs are not accurate for complex tropical forests.
Article
Ecology
Nancy C. Garwood, Margaret R. Metz, Simon A. Queenborough, Viveca Persson, S. Joseph Wright, David F. R. P. Burslem, Milton Zambrano, Renato Valencia
Summary: A long-term study of flowering and fruiting phenology in the Yasuni forest in eastern Ecuador showed strong seasonal patterns. Flowering peaked in September-November, while fruiting peaked in March-April. The study also found that irradiance and rainfall also exhibited seasonal variations. This suggests that reproductive phenology is generally seasonal in the ever-wet lowland equatorial forests of northwestern Amazonia.
Article
Geography, Physical
Calvin Ka Fai Lee, Guangqin Song, Helene C. Muller-Landau, Shengbiao Wu, S. Joseph Wright, K. C. Cushman, Raquel Fernandes Araujo, Stephanie Bohlman, Yingyi Zhao, Ziyu Lin, Zounachuan Sun, Peter Chuen Yan Cheng, Michael Kwok-Po Ng, Jin Wu
Summary: A method integrating deep learning algorithm with high resolution imagery from drone surveys was developed to accurately detect flowering species and track flowering timing in a tropical forest. The method demonstrated high accuracy in classifying flowers and showed potential in advancing fine-scale flower monitoring in the tropics.
ISPRS JOURNAL OF PHOTOGRAMMETRY AND REMOTE SENSING
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Michael Kalyuzhny, Jeffrey K. Lake, S. Joseph Wright, Annette M. Ostling
Summary: For species to coexist, there must be a decline in performance as conspecific density increases. In this study, it is shown that adults of tropical forest tree species exhibit strong spatial repulsion, indicating substantial niche differences between species. The results demonstrate that conspecific negative density dependence can play a significant role in stabilizing species diversity.
Article
Soil Science
Molly E. Huber, Joseph B. Yavitt, S. Joseph Wright
Summary: This study investigated the physical association between minerals and organic matter in different types of soils in the Barro Colorado Island tropical forest in Panama. The results showed that macroaggregates, composed of plant detritus and microaggregates, play a key role in protecting soil organic matter.
Article
Microbiology
Yan Xie, Liuqing Shi, Keke Cheng, Yang Li, Shixiao Yu
Summary: The molecular mechanism of host-specific pathogenesis in the Endomelanconiopsis endophytica strain LS29, a pathogen of the subtropical tree Castanopsis fissa, remains to be explored. Through transcriptome sequencing, it was found that the fungus repressed other microbes and produced antibiotics to attack the host tissue within 24 hours of infection. Various effectors were secreted to recognize the host plant, but their expression regulation changed significantly after 24 hours, indicating a key time point for host recognition and specific infection. Only a few effectors were identified as specific effectors involved in the early infection process.
Article
Plant Sciences
Jason Vleminckx, J. Aaron Hogan, Margaret R. Metz, Liza S. Comita, Simon A. Queenborough, S. Joseph Wright, Renato Valencia, Milton Zambrano, Nancy C. Garwood
Summary: Research shows that flower production in everwet western Amazonian forests declines as nighttime temperature and relative humidity increase, suggesting a negative impact of warmer nights and greater atmospheric water saturation on reproduction. Different plant species exhibit varying responses to climatic variables, but this variation is not explained by life form or phylogeny.
Article
Ecology
Chia-Hao Chang-Yang, Po-Hui Chiang, S. Joseph Wright, Chang-Fu Hsieh, I-Fang Sun
Summary: Plants have evolved mechanisms to track seasonal variation in environmental resources, enabling them to time key life-history events to appropriate seasons. Our study compared the first flowering dates predicted by different cues in a subtropical rainforest. We found that temperature cues best explained interannual variation in flowering dates, while cues associated with photoperiod, irradiance, and rainfall had lower predictive power.