Journal ArticleDOI
Partitioning selection and complementarity in biodiversity experiments
Michel Loreau,Andy Hector +1 more
TLDR
The selection effect is zero on average and varies from negative to positive in different localities, depending on whether species with lower- or higher-than-average biomass dominate communities, while the complementarity effect is positive overall, supporting the hypothesis that plant diversity influences primary production in European grasslands through niche differentiation or facilitation.Abstract:
The impact of biodiversity loss on the functioning of ecosystems and their ability to provide ecological services has become a central issue in ecology. Several experiments have provided evidence that reduced species diversity may impair ecosystem processes such as plant biomass production. The interpretation of these experiments, however, has been controversial because two types of mechanism may operate in combination. In the 'selection effect', dominance by species with particular traits affects ecosystem processes. In the 'complementarity effect', resource partitioning or positive interactions lead to increased total resource use. Here we present a new approach to separate the two effects on the basis of an additive partitioning analogous to the Price equation in evolutionary genetics. Applying this method to data from the pan-European BIODEPTH experiment reveals that the selection effect is zero on average and varies from negative to positive in different localities, depending on whether species with lower- or higher-than-average biomass dominate communities. In contrast, the complementarity effect is positive overall, supporting the hypothesis that plant diversity influences primary production in European grasslands through niche differentiation or facilitation.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Effects of biodiversity on ecosystem functioning: a consensus of current knowledge
D. U. Hooper,F. S. Chapin,John J. Ewel,Andy Hector,P. Inchausti,Sandra Lavorel,John H. Lawton,David M. Lodge,Michel Loreau,Shahid Naeem,Bernhard Schmid,Heikki Setälä,Amy J. Symstad,John Vandermeer,David A. Wardle,David A. Wardle +15 more
TL;DR: Understanding this complexity, while taking strong steps to minimize current losses of species, is necessary for responsible management of Earth's ecosystems and the diverse biota they contain.
Journal ArticleDOI
Biodiversity loss and its impact on humanity
Bradley J. Cardinale,J. Emmett Duffy,Andrew Gonzalez,David U. Hooper,Charles Perrings,Patrick Venail,Anita Narwani,Georgina M. Mace,David Tilman,David A. Wardle,Ann P. Kinzig,Gretchen C. Daily,Michel Loreau,James B. Grace,Anne Larigauderie,Diane S. Srivastava,Shahid Naeem +16 more
TL;DR: It is argued that human actions are dismantling the Earth’s ecosystems, eliminating genes, species and biological traits at an alarming rate, and the question of how such loss of biological diversity will alter the functioning of ecosystems and their ability to provide society with the goods and services needed to prosper is asked.
Journal ArticleDOI
Humans integrate visual and haptic information in a statistically optimal fashion.
TL;DR: The nervous system seems to combine visual and haptic information in a fashion that is similar to a maximum-likelihood integrator, and this model behaved very similarly to humans in a visual–haptic task.
Journal ArticleDOI
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning: Current Knowledge and Future Challenges
Michel Loreau,Shahid Naeem,Pablo Inchausti,Jan Bengtsson,J. P. Grime,Andy Hector,David U. Hooper,Michael A. Huston,Dave Raffaelli,Bernhard Schmid,David Tilman,David A. Wardle +11 more
TL;DR: Larger numbers of species are probably needed to reduce temporal variability in ecosystem processes in changing environments and to determine how biodiversity dynamics, ecosystem processes, and abiotic factors interact.
Journal ArticleDOI
Landscape perspectives on agricultural intensification and biodiversity – ecosystem service management
TL;DR: In this article, the negative and positive effects of agricultural land use for the conservation of biodiversity, and its relation to ecosystem services, need a landscape perspective, which is difficult to be found in the literature.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Mycorrhizal fungal diversity determines plant biodiversity, ecosystem variability and productivity
Marcel G. A. van der Heijden,John N. Klironomos,Margot Ursic,Peter Moutoglis,R. Streitwolf-Engel,Thomas Boller,Andres Wiemken,Ian R. Sanders +7 more
TL;DR: It is shown that below-ground diversity of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) is a major factor contributing to the maintenance of plant biodiversity and to ecosystem functioning, and that microbial interactions can drive ecosystem functions such as plant biodiversity, productivity and variability.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Influence of Functional Diversity and Composition on Ecosystem Processes
David Tilman,Johannes M. H. Knops,David A. Wedin,Peter B. Reich,Mark E. Ritchie,Evan Siemann +5 more
TL;DR: Functional composition and functional diversity were the principal factors explaining plant productivity, plant percent nitrogen, plant total nitrogen, and light penetration in grassland plots.
Journal ArticleDOI
Productivity and sustainability influenced by biodiversity in grassland ecosystems
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used a well-replicated field experiment, in which species diversity was directly controlled, to show that ecosystem productivity in 147 grassland plots increased significantly with plant biodiversity.
Journal ArticleDOI
Plant diversity and productivity experiments in european grasslands
Andy Hector,Bernhard Schmid,Carl Beierkuhnlein,Maria C. Caldeira,M. Diemer,Panayiotis G. Dimitrakopoulos,John A. Finn,Helena Freitas,Paul S. Giller,J. Good,R. Harris,Peter Högberg,Kerstin Huss-Danell,Jasmin Joshi,Ari Jumpponen,Christian Körner,Paul Leadley,Michel Loreau,A. Minns,Christa P. H. Mulder,G. O'Donovan,S. J. Otway,João Pereira,Alexandra Prinz,David Read,Michael Scherer-Lorenzen,Ernst Detlef Schulze,A.-S. D. Siamantziouras,Eva Spehn,A. C. Terry,Andreas Y. Troumbis,F. I. Woodward,Shigeo Yachi,John H. Lawton +33 more
TL;DR: Niche complementarity and positive species interactions appear to play a role in generating diversity-productivity relationships within sites in addition to sampling from the species pool.
Journal ArticleDOI
Selection and covariance.
TL;DR: This is a preliminary communication describing applications to genetical selection of a new mathematical treatment of selection in general.
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Plant diversity and productivity experiments in european grasslands
Andy Hector,Bernhard Schmid,Carl Beierkuhnlein,Maria C. Caldeira,M. Diemer,Panayiotis G. Dimitrakopoulos,John A. Finn,Helena Freitas,Paul S. Giller,J. Good,R. Harris,Peter Högberg,Kerstin Huss-Danell,Jasmin Joshi,Ari Jumpponen,Christian Körner,Paul Leadley,Michel Loreau,A. Minns,Christa P. H. Mulder,G. O'Donovan,S. J. Otway,João Pereira,Alexandra Prinz,David Read,Michael Scherer-Lorenzen,Ernst Detlef Schulze,A.-S. D. Siamantziouras,Eva Spehn,A. C. Terry,Andreas Y. Troumbis,F. I. Woodward,Shigeo Yachi,John H. Lawton +33 more