Mechanistic prediction of community composition across resource conditions and species richness.

ABSTRACT: Predicting species coexistence and community assembly is a central goal in ecology. Traditional methods, based on the effect of one species on another (e.g., Lotka-Volterra competition model), are sensitive to environmental context. This is because they ignore the fundamental processes that can be applied across environments. While mechanistic approaches offer promise, empirical tests remain rare. Here, we integrate a mechanistic consumer-resource model with the growth of 12 phytoplankton species in monoculture over a range of nitrate, ammonium or phosphorous concentrations. We find that the mechanistic approach accurately predicts the composition of 960 communities across species richness and resource conditions. We confirm by simulations, species competing for substitutable resources (ni

SUBMITTER: Zhang Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12612213 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature