Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments
Despite the rich biodiversity found in nature, it is unclear to what extent some combinations of interacting species, while conceivable in a given place and time, may never be realized. Yet solving this problem is important for understanding the role of randomness and predictability in the assembly...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
University of Chicago Press
2021
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/133067 |
| _version_ | 1811079545567051776 |
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| author | Medeiros, Lucas P Boege, Karina del-Val, Ek Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro Saavedra, Serguei |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Medeiros, Lucas P Boege, Karina del-Val, Ek Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro Saavedra, Serguei |
| author_sort | Medeiros, Lucas P |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Despite the rich biodiversity found in nature, it is unclear to what extent some combinations of interacting species, while conceivable in a given place and time, may never be realized. Yet solving this problem is important for understanding the role of randomness and predictability in the assembly of ecological communities. Here we show that the specific combinations of interacting species that emerge from the ecological dynamics within regional species pools are not all equally likely to be seen; rather, they are among the most likely to persist under changing environments. First, we use niche-based competition matrices and Lotka-Volterra models to demonstrate that realized combinations of interacting species are more likely to persist under random parameter perturbations than the majority of potential combinations with the same number of species that could have been formed from the regional pool. We then corroborate our theoretical results using a 10-year observational study, recording 88 plant-herbivore communities across three different forest successional stages. By inferring and validating plant-mediated communities of competing herbivore species, we find that observed combinations of herbivores have an expected probability of species persistence higher than half of all potential combinations. Our findings open up the opportunity to establish a formal probabilistic and predictive understanding of the composition of ecological communities. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:16:43Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/133067 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:16:43Z |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| publisher | University of Chicago Press |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1330672024-06-06T14:04:09Z Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments Medeiros, Lucas P Boege, Karina del-Val, Ek Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro Saavedra, Serguei Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Despite the rich biodiversity found in nature, it is unclear to what extent some combinations of interacting species, while conceivable in a given place and time, may never be realized. Yet solving this problem is important for understanding the role of randomness and predictability in the assembly of ecological communities. Here we show that the specific combinations of interacting species that emerge from the ecological dynamics within regional species pools are not all equally likely to be seen; rather, they are among the most likely to persist under changing environments. First, we use niche-based competition matrices and Lotka-Volterra models to demonstrate that realized combinations of interacting species are more likely to persist under random parameter perturbations than the majority of potential combinations with the same number of species that could have been formed from the regional pool. We then corroborate our theoretical results using a 10-year observational study, recording 88 plant-herbivore communities across three different forest successional stages. By inferring and validating plant-mediated communities of competing herbivore species, we find that observed combinations of herbivores have an expected probability of species persistence higher than half of all potential combinations. Our findings open up the opportunity to establish a formal probabilistic and predictive understanding of the composition of ecological communities. 2021-10-21T14:38:49Z 2021-10-21T14:38:49Z 2020-11 2020-02 2021-10-21T13:02:59Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0003-0147 1537-5323 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/133067 Observed Ecological Communities Are Formed by Species Combinations That Are among the Most Likely to Persist under Changing Environments, Lucas P. Medeiros, Karina Boege, Ek del-Val, Alejandro Zaldívar-Riverón, and Serguei Saavedra, The American Naturalist 2021 197:1, E17-E29 en 10.1086/711663 American Naturalist Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. application/pdf University of Chicago Press University of Chicago Press |
| spellingShingle | Medeiros, Lucas P Boege, Karina del-Val, Ek Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro Saavedra, Serguei Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title | Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title_full | Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title_fullStr | Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title_full_unstemmed | Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title_short | Observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| title_sort | observed ecological communities are formed by species combinations that are among the most likely to persist under changing environments |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/133067 |
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