Evolutionary history and the effect of biodiversity on plant productivity
Evolutionary history and the effect of biodiversity on plant productivity
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DOI：
10.1073/pnas.0805962105
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发表时间：
2008-11-04
影响因子：
11.1
通讯作者：
Oakley, Todd H.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Cadotte, Marc W.;Cardinale, Bradley J.;Oakley, Todd H.
由于灭绝而导致的生物多样性丧失是全球环境最显着的变化之一。几十年来，研究人员一直试图通过研究生物量与许多生物多样性指标（特别是物种和功能群的数量）之间的关系来了解生物多样性的变化如何影响生物量生产。这项研究主要集中在物种上，隐含的假设是它们是独立的实体。然而，功能和生态上的相似性是由共同祖先的模式决定的，因此远缘物种可能比近亲对生产的贡献更大，这可能是通过增加生态位宽度来实现的。在这里，我们分析了 20 年来在世界各地草原生态系统中进行的实验，并研究组成群落的物种之间的进化关系是否可以预测生物多样性如何影响植物生物量生产。我们表明，群落内的系统发育多样性的数量比其他多样性指标（例如物种或功能群的数量）解释了植物群落生物量的更多变化。我们的结果揭示了进化历史如何为理解、预测和潜在改善生物多样性丧失的影响提供关键信息，并应成为新的生物多样性实验的动力。
Loss of biological diversity because of extinction is one of the most pronounced changes to the global environment. For several decades, researchers have tried to understand how changes in biodiversity might impact biomass production by examining how biomass correlates with a number of biodiversity metrics (especially the number of species and functional groups). This body of research has focused on species with the implicit assumption that they are independent entities. However, functional and ecological similarities are shaped by patterns of common ancestry, such that distantly related species might contribute more to production than close relatives, perhaps by increasing niche breadth. Here, we analyze 2 decades of experiments performed in grassland ecosystems throughout the world and examine whether the evolutionary relationships among the species comprising a community predict how biodiversity impacts plant biomass production. We show that the amount of phylogenetic diversity within communities explained significantly more variation in plant community biomass than other measures of diversity, such as the number of species or functional groups. Our results reveal how evolutionary history can provide critical information for understanding, predicting, and potentially ameliorating the effects of biodiversity loss and should serve as an impetus for new biodiversity experiments.