Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/30512
Title: Multitrophic diversity in a biodiverse forest is highly nonlinear across spatial scales
Contributor(s): Schuldt, Andreas (author); Wubet, Tesfaye (author); Buscot, François (author); Staab, Michael (author); Assmann, Thorsten (author); Böhnke-Kammerlander, Martin (author); Both, Sabine  (author)orcid ; Erfmeier, Alexandra (author); Klein, Alexandra-Maria (author); Ma, Keping (author); Pietsch, Katherina (author); Schultze, Sabrina (author); Wirth, Christian (author); Zhang, Jiayong (author); Zumstein, Pascale (author); Bruelheide, Helge (author)
Publication Date: 2015-12-10
Open Access: Yes
DOI: 10.1038/ncomms10169
Handle Link: https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/30512
Abstract: Subtropical and tropical forests are biodiversity hotspots, and untangling the spatial scaling of their diversity is fundamental for understanding global species richness and conserving biodiversity essential to human well-being. However, scale-dependent diversity distributions among coexisting taxa remain poorly understood for heterogeneous environments in biodiverse regions. We show that diversity relations among 43 taxa - including plants, arthropods and microorganisms - in a mountainous subtropical forest are highly nonlinear across spatial scales. Taxon-specific differences in β-diversity cause under- or overestimation of overall diversity by up to 50% when using surrogate taxa such as plants. Similar relationships may apply to half of all (sub)tropical forests - including major biodiversity hotspots - where high environmental heterogeneity causes high biodiversity and species turnover. Our study highlights that our general understanding of biodiversity patterns has to be improved - and that much larger areas will be required than in better-studied lowland forests - to reliably estimate biodiversity distributions and devise conservation strategies for the world's biodiverse regions.
Publication Type: Journal Article
Source of Publication: Nature Communications, v.6, p. 1-8
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
Place of Publication: United Kingdom
ISSN: 2041-1723
Fields of Research (FoR) 2008: 060202 Community Ecology (excl. Invasive Species Ecology)
050102 Ecosystem Function
060208 Terrestrial Ecology
Fields of Research (FoR) 2020: 310302 Community ecology (excl. invasive species ecology)
410203 Ecosystem function
310308 Terrestrial ecology
Socio-Economic Objective (SEO) 2008: 960806 Forest and Woodlands Flora, Fauna and Biodiversity
Socio-Economic Objective (SEO) 2020: 180606 Terrestrial biodiversity
Peer Reviewed: Yes
HERDC Category Description: C1 Refereed Article in a Scholarly Journal
Appears in Collections:Journal Article
School of Environmental and Rural Science

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