Julio R. Gutiérrez

TL;DR: A global empirical study relating plant species richness and abiotic factors to multifunctionality in drylands, which collectively cover 41% of Earth’s land surface and support over 38% of the human population, suggests that the preservation of plant biodiversity is crucial to buffer negative effects of climate change and desertification in dryland.

TL;DR: Any predicted increase in aridity with climate change will probably reduce the concentrations of N and C in global drylands, but increase that of P, suggesting the provision of key services provided by these ecosystems could be negatively affected.

TL;DR: Fernando T. Maestre,* Jose L. Quero, Nicholas J. Gotelli, Adrian Escudero, Victoria Ochoa, Manuel Delgado-Baquerizo, Miguel Garcia-Gomez, Matthew A. Eldridge, Carlos I. Espinosa, Adriana Florentino, Juan Gaitan, M. Gabriel Gatica, Wahida Ghiloufi, Susana Gomez-Gonzalez, Julio R. Gutierrez, Rosa M. Veiga, Deli Wang, Eli Zaady

TL;DR: It is suggested that changes in aridity, such as those predicted by climate-change models, may reduce microbial abundance and diversity, a response that will likely impact the provision of key ecosystem services by global drylands.

TL;DR: The authors' increasing ability to predict El Niño effects can be used to enhance management strategies for the restoration of degraded ecosystems, and suggest that the predicted change in extreme climatic events resulting from global warming could profoundly alter biodiversity and ecosystem functioning in many regions of the world.