AI Insight
This study examined how species interaction networks across multiple trophic levels influence ecosystem multifunctionality using data from a large-scale tree biodiversity experiment. The researchers found that network structure characteristics—including network size, niche overlap among interacting species, and linkage density—consistently affected ecosystem multifunctionality across both antagonistic and mutualistic interactions. The results indicate that specialized interactions and functional similarity among species promote multifunctionality, beyond the effects of species diversity alone.
Why it matters
These findings suggest that effective biodiversity conservation and ecosystem management must consider not only the number of species at different trophic levels, but also how those species interact with each other. Understanding interaction network structure could improve strategies for maintaining ecosystem services that human well-being depends upon.
Understand the Science
⚠️ Preprint – Noch nicht peer-reviewed
Dieser Artikel wurde noch nicht von unabhängigen Experten begutachtet. Die Ergebnisse sind vorläufig und sollten mit Vorsicht interpretiert werden.
Biodiversity loss threatens the multifunctionality of ecosystems on which human well-being ultimately depends. Changes in multitrophic species interactions may be key to explaining the ecological consequences of biodiversity loss, but research explicitly linking species interactions and ecosystem multifunctionality remains rare. To assess interaction-mediated biodiversity effects and underlying mechanisms, characterizing the structure of species interaction networks is invaluable. Using comprehensive species interaction and ecosystem functioning data from a large-scale tree biodiversity experiment, we find consistent effects of the structure of species interaction networks on ecosystem multifunctionality across multiple types of antagonistic and mutualistic interactions. While positive effects of network size align with expected positive effects of multitrophic species diversity, positive effects of niche overlap among interacting species and negative effects of highly connected species (i.e. high linkage density) reveal additional, interaction-mediated drivers of multifunctionality. Specifically, the effects of niche overlap suggest benefits of functionally similar species, and the effects of linkage density underscore the importance of specialized interactions in promoting ecosystem multifunctionality. These findings emphasize that to effectively safeguard ecosystem service provisioning, ecosystem management and biodiversity conservation not only need to account for biodiversity changes at multiple trophic levels, but also explicitly for how species interact among each other.
Source: Multitrophic interaction networks mediate biodiversity effects on ecosystem multifunctionality