Niche and neutral models predict asymptotically equivalent species abundance distributions in high-diversity ecological communities.

ABSTRACT: A fundamental challenge in ecology is to understand the mechanisms that govern patterns of relative species abundance. Previous numerical simulations have suggested that complex niche-structured models produce species abundance distributions (SADs) that are qualitatively similar to those of very simple neutral models that ignore differences between species. However, in the absence of an analytical treatment of niche models, one cannot tell whether the two classes of model produce the same patterns via similar or different mechanisms. We present an analytical proof that, in the limit as diversity becomes large, a strong niche model give rises to exactly the same asymptotic form of SAD as the neutral model, and we verify the analytical predictions for a Panamanian tropical forest data set. O

SUBMITTER: Chisholm RA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2936647 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature