scholarly journals Assessing metacommunity processes through signatures in spatiotemporal turnover of community composition

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franck Jabot ◽  
Fabien Laroche ◽  
François Massol ◽  
Florent Arthaud ◽  
Julie Crabot ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Variability ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Environmental Filtering ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Temporal Part ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Metacommunity Ecology ◽  
Path Analyses ◽  
Metacommunity Dynamics ◽  
Acting In Concert

AbstractAlthough metacommunity ecology has been a major field of research in the last decades, with both conceptual and empirical outputs, the analysis of the temporal dynamics of metacommunities has only emerged recently and consists mostly of repeated static analyses. Here, we propose a novel analytical framework to assess metacommunity processes using path analyses of spatial and temporal diversity turnovers. We detail the principles and practical aspects of this framework and apply it to simulated datasets to illustrate its ability to decipher the respective contributions of entangled drivers of metacommunity dynamics. We then apply it to four empirical datasets. Empirical results support the view that metacommunity dynamics may be generally shaped by multiple ecological processes acting in concert, with environmental filtering being variable across both space and time. These results reinforce our call to go beyond static analyses of metacommunities that are blind to the temporal part of environmental variability.

scholarly journals Dormancy in metacommunities

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan I. Wisnoski ◽  
Mathew A. Leibold ◽  
Jay T. Lennon
Keyword(s):  
Species Interactions ◽  
Environmental Variability ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Priority Effects ◽  
Ephemeral Ponds ◽  
Metacommunity Ecology ◽  
Structure And Dynamics ◽  
Metacommunity Dynamics ◽  
Level Process ◽  
Temporal Dispersal

Although metacommunity ecology has improved our understanding of how dispersal affects community structure and dynamics across spatial scales, it has yet to adequately account for dormancy. Dormancy is a reversible state of reduced metabolic activity that enables temporal dispersal within the metacommunity. Dormancy is also a metacommunity-level process because it can covary with spatial dispersal and affect diversity across spatial scales. We develop a framework to integrate dispersal and dormancy, focusing on the covariation they exhibit, to predict how dormancy modifies the importance of species interactions, dispersal, and historical contingencies in metacommunities. We examine case studies of microcrustaceans in ephemeral ponds, where dormancy is integral to metacommunity dynamics. We analyze traits of bromeliad-dwelling invertebrates and identify constraints on dispersal and dormancy strategies. Using simulations, we demonstrate that dormancy can alter classic metacommunity patterns of diversity in ways that depend on dispersal–dormancy covariation and spatiotemporal environmental variability. We propose that dormancy may also facilitate evolution-mediated priority effects if locally adapted seed banks prevent colonization by more dispersal-limited species. We present theoretically and empirically testable predictions for other possible ecological and evolutionary implications of dormancy in metacommunities, some of which may fundamentally alter our understanding of metacommunity ecology.

Geo-Informatics for Land Use and Biodiversity Studies

2011 ◽  
pp. 52-77
Author(s):  
P. K. Joshi ◽  
Neena Priyanka
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Mitigation Measures ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Holistic Understanding ◽  
Global Positioning ◽  
Geospatial Tools ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Impact On Biodiversity

The dynamics of land use/land cover (LU/LC) is a manifestation of the cyclic correlation among the kind and magnitude of causes, impacts, responses and resulting ecological processes of the ecosystem. Thus, the holistic understanding of the complex mechanisms that control LU/LC requires synergetic adoption of measurement approaches, addressing issues, and identifying drivers of change and state of art technologies for mitigation measures. As the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of the LU/LC increases, its impact on biodiversity becomes even more difficult to anticipate. Thus, in order to understand the spatio-temporal dynamics of change in landscape and its relationship to biodiversity, it is necessary to reliably identify and quantify the indicators of change. In addition, it is also important to have better understanding of the technologies and techniques that serve as complimentary tool for land mitigation and conservation planning. Against this background, the chapter aims to synthesize LU/LC studies worldwide and their impacts on biodiversity. This chapter explores identification and analysis of key natural, socio-economic and regulatory drivers for LU/LC. Finally, it attempts to collate some LU/LC studies involving usage of geospatial tools, such as satellite remote sensing, Geographic Information System (GIS), Global Positioning System (GPS), and integrative tools, besides conventional approaches that could assist decision makers, land managers, stakeholders and researchers in better management and formulation of conservation strategies based on scientific grounds.

scholarly journals Phylogenetic overdispersion of plant species in southern Brazilian savannas

2009 ◽  
Vol 69 (3) ◽  
pp. 843-849 ◽  
Author(s):  
IA. Silva ◽  
MA. Batalha
Keyword(s):  
Phylogenetic Relationships ◽  
Plant Traits ◽  
Environmental Filtering ◽  
Southeastern Brazil ◽  
Ecological Communities ◽  
Ecological Interactions ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Phylogenetic Structure ◽  
History Of ◽  
Phylogenetic Overdispersion

Ecological communities are the result of not only present ecological processes, such as competition among species and environmental filtering, but also past and continuing evolutionary processes. Based on these assumptions, we may infer mechanisms of contemporary coexistence from the phylogenetic relationships of the species in a community. We studied the phylogenetic structure of plant communities in four cerrado sites, in southeastern Brazil. We calculated two raw phylogenetic distances among the species sampled. We estimated the phylogenetic structure by comparing the observed phylogenetic distances to the distribution of phylogenetic distances in null communities. We obtained null communities by randomizing the phylogenetic relationships of the regional pool of species. We found a phylogenetic overdispersion of the cerrado species. Phylogenetic overdispersion has several explanations, depending on the phylogenetic history of traits and contemporary ecological interactions. However, based on coexistence models between grasses and trees, density-dependent ecological forces, and the evolutionary history of the cerrado flora, we argue that the phylogenetic overdispersion of cerrado species is predominantly due to competitive interactions, herbivores and pathogen attacks, and ecological speciation. Future studies will need to include information on the phylogenetic history of plant traits.

scholarly journals A Metacommunity Approach to Improve Biological Assessments in Highly Dynamic Freshwater Ecosystems

BioScience ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 70 (5) ◽  
pp. 427-438 ◽  
Author(s):  
Núria Cid ◽  
Núria Bonada ◽  
Jani Heino ◽  
Miguel Cañedo-Argüelles ◽  
Julie Crabot ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Environmental Variability ◽  
Anthropogenic Impacts ◽  
Dispersal Limitation ◽  
Freshwater Ecosystems ◽  
Metacommunity Ecology ◽  
Intermittent Rivers ◽  
Biological Assessments ◽  
Quality Assessments ◽  
Flow Intermittence

Abstract Rapid shifts in biotic communities due to environmental variability challenge the detection of anthropogenic impacts by current biomonitoring programs. Metacommunity ecology has the potential to inform such programs, because it combines dispersal processes with niche-based approaches and recognizes variability in community composition. Using intermittent rivers—prevalent and highly dynamic ecosystems that sometimes dry—we develop a conceptual model to illustrate how dispersal limitation and flow intermittence influence the performance of biological indices. We produce a methodological framework integrating physical- and organismal-based dispersal measurements into predictive modeling, to inform development of dynamic ecological quality assessments. Such metacommunity-based approaches could be extended to other ecosystems and are required to underpin our capacity to monitor and protect ecosystems threatened under future environmental changes.

scholarly journals Environmental Filtering Drives the Assembly of Habitat Generalists and Specialists in the Coastal Sand Microbial Communities of Southern China

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (12) ◽  
pp. 598 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anyi Hu ◽  
Hongjie Wang ◽  
Meixian Cao ◽  
Azhar Rashid ◽  
Mingfeng Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Microbial Communities ◽  
Southern China ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Environmental Filtering ◽  
Amplicon Sequencing ◽  
Neutral Model ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Opposite Pattern ◽  
Coastal Sand ◽  
Habitat Generalists

Coastal sands harbor diverse microbial assemblages that play a critical role in the biogeochemical cycling of beach ecosystems. However, little is known about the relative importance of the different ecological processes underlying the assembly of communities of sand microbiota. Here, we employed 16S rDNA amplicon sequencing to investigate the sand microbiota of two coastal beaches, in southern China. The results showed that sand microbial assemblages at intertidal and supratidal zones exhibited contrasting compositions that can be attributed to environmental filtering by electric conductivity. A consistent pattern of habitat generalists and specialists of sand microbiota was observed among different beach zones. Null and neutral model analyses indicated that the environmental filtering was mainly responsible for supratidal microbial communities, while the neutral processes could partially influence the assembly of intertidal communities. Moreover, environmental filtering was found to shape the habitat specialists, while random dispersal played a major role in shaping generalists. The neutral model analysis revealed that the habitat generalists exceeding the neutral prediction harbored a relatively higher proportion of microbial taxa than the specialist counterparts. An opposite pattern was observed for taxa falling below the neutral prediction. Collectively, these findings offer a novel insight into the assembly mechanisms of coastal sand microbiota.

scholarly journals Morphology predicts species' functional roles and their degree of specialization in plant–frugivore interactions

2016 ◽  
Vol 283 (1823) ◽  
pp. 20152444 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Matthias Dehling ◽  
Pedro Jordano ◽  
H. Martin Schaefer ◽  
Katrin Böhning-Gaese ◽  
Matthias Schleuning
Keyword(s):  
Resource Use ◽  
Bird Species ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Functional Roles ◽  
Functional Differences ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Interaction Partners ◽  
Role Based ◽  
Morphological Differences

Species' functional roles in key ecosystem processes such as predation, pollination or seed dispersal are determined by the resource use of consumer species. An interaction between resource and consumer species usually requires trait matching (e.g. a congruence in the morphologies of interaction partners). Species' morphology should therefore determine species' functional roles in ecological processes mediated by mutualistic or antagonistic interactions. We tested this assumption for Neotropical plant–bird mutualisms. We used a new analytical framework that assesses a species's functional role based on the analysis of the traits of its interaction partners in a multidimensional trait space. We employed this framework to test (i) whether there is correspondence between the morphology of bird species and their functional roles and (ii) whether morphologically specialized birds fulfil specialized functional roles. We found that morphological differences between bird species reflected their functional differences: (i) bird species with different morphologies foraged on distinct sets of plant species and (ii) morphologically distinct bird species fulfilled specialized functional roles. These findings encourage further assessments of species' functional roles through the analysis of their interaction partners, and the proposed analytical framework facilitates a wide range of novel analyses for network and community ecology.

scholarly journals “Critical Ecosystems” as a Concept in Political Ecology - Developing a Comprehensive Analytical Framework

2020 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 190-212
Author(s):  
Michael Acheampong
Keyword(s):  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Political Ecology ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Local Population ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Population Based ◽  
Resource Exploitation ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Symbiotic Relationships ◽  
Political Dimensions

Political ecology is supposed to be a field of two parts of equal importance – "politics" and "ecology." However, critics have pointed to the fact that it dwells on the politics, while rendering ecology secondary in its focus. Political ecologists have hardly used the structure that the concept of ecosystem services brought to the field of ecology, and this lends credence to this critique. In this article, I introduce the concept of "critical ecosystems" that reinforces understanding of the science of "ecology", as an important dimension of political ecology. I use components of the framework of ecosystem services in context of unequal power relations. Some local people who have symbiotic relationships with their environment owe their existence – both their livelihoods and culture – to specific natural resources whose decline has proximate and tangible consequences for them. However, they often lose these "critical ecosystems" in times of natural resource exploitation due to their relative powerlessness. I argue that it is important that political ecologists utilize the framework of ecosystem services in our inquiries, to prioritize those ecosystems that are intricately connected to the survival of the local population. Based on this, I introduce the "critical ecosystems" model, and how it can be modified to fit specific cases and can reconcile the sociological and political dimensions of political ecology, with biophysical understanding of ecological processes. This holistic inquiry, I argue, will make political ecology worthy of its name.  Keywords: Political ecology; ecosystem services; unequal power relations; Millennium Ecosystems Assessment; Ghana

scholarly journals Ecological theory applied to environmental metabolomes reveals compositional divergence despite conserved molecular properties

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Danczak ◽  
Amy E. Goldman ◽  
Rosalie K. Chu ◽  
Jason G. Toyoda ◽  
Vanessa A. Garayburu-Caruso ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Filtering ◽  
Molecular Properties ◽  
Freshwater Ecosystem ◽  
Ecological Communities ◽  
Ecological Concept ◽  
Metacommunity Ecology ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Underlying Mechanisms ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Dom Composition

AbstractStream and river systems transport and process substantial amounts of dissolved organic matter (DOM) from terrestrial and aquatic sources to the ocean, with global biogeochemical implications. However, the underlying mechanisms affecting the spatiotemporal organization of DOM composition are under-investigated. To understand the principles governing DOM composition, we leverage the recently proposed synthesis of metacommunity ecology and metabolomics, termed ‘meta-metabolome ecology.’ Applying this novel approach to a freshwater ecosystem, we demonstrated that despite similar molecular properties across metabolomes, metabolite identity significantly diverged due to environmental filtering. We refer to this phenomenon as ‘thermodynamic redundancy,’ which is analogous to the ecological concept of functional redundancy. We suggest that under thermodynamic redundancy, divergent metabolomes can support equivalent biogeochemical function just as divergent ecological communities can support equivalent ecosystem function. As these analyses are performed in additional ecosystems, potentially generalizable principles, like thermodynamic redundancy, can be revealed and provide insight into DOM dynamics.

scholarly journals Coexistence patterns and diversity in a trait-based metacommunity on an environmental gradient

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mozzamil Mohammed ◽  
Bernd Blasius ◽  
Alexey Ryabov
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Gradient ◽  
Environmental Variability ◽  
Environmental Filtering ◽  
Optimal Growth ◽  
Growth Conditions ◽  
Spatially Explicit Model ◽  
Regional Diversity ◽  
Local Species Richness ◽  
Local Species ◽  
Source Sink

AbstractThe dynamics of trait-based metacommunities have attracted much attention, but not much is known about how dispersal and spatial environmental variability mutually interact with each other to drive coexistence patterns and diversity. Here, we present a spatially explicit model of competition for two essential resources in a metacommunity on a one-dimensional environmental gradient. We find that both the strength of dispersal and the range of spatial environmental variability affect coexistence patterns, spatial structure, trait distribution, and local and regional diversity. Without dispersal, species are sorted according to their optimal growth conditions on the gradient. With the onset of dispersal, source-sink effects are initiated, which increases the effects of environmental filtering and interspecific competition and generates trait lumping, so that only a few species from an environment-defined trait range can survive. Interestingly, for very large dispersal rates, species distributions become spatially homogeneous, but nevertheless two species at the extreme ends of the trade-off curve can coexist for large environmental variability. Local species richness follows a classic hump-shaped dependence on dispersal rate, while local and regional diversity exhibit a pronounced peak for intermediate values of the environmental variability. Our findings provide important insights into the factors that shape the structure of trait-based metacommunities.

scholarly journals Community Bioacoustics: Studying Acoustic Community Structure for Ecological and Conservation Insights

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vaibhav Chhaya ◽  
Sutirtha Lahiri ◽  
M. Abhinava Jagan ◽  
Ram Mohan ◽  
Nafisa A. Pathaw ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Community Structure ◽  
Ecological Monitoring ◽  
Acoustic Signals ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Ecological Change ◽  
Anthropogenic Change ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Acoustic Data ◽  
Acoustic Community ◽  
Passive Acoustic

The diversity of animal acoustic signals has evolved due to multiple ecological processes, both biotic and abiotic. At the level of communities of signaling animals, these processes may lead to diverse outcomes, including partitioning of acoustic signals along multiple axes (divergent signal parameters, signaling locations, and timing). Acoustic data provides information on the organization, diversity and dynamics of an acoustic community, and thus enables study of ecological change and turnover in a non-intrusive way. In this review, we lay out how community bioacoustics (the study of acoustic community structure and dynamics), has value in ecological monitoring and conservation of diverse landscapes and taxa. First, we review the concepts of signal space, signal partitioning and their effects on the structure of acoustic communities. Next, we highlight how spatiotemporal ecological change is reflected in acoustic community structure, and the potential this presents in monitoring and conservation. As passive acoustic monitoring gains popularity worldwide, we propose that the analytical framework of community bioacoustics has promise in studying the response of entire suites of species (from insects to large whales) to rapid anthropogenic change.

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