Unmasking structural patterns in incidence matrices: an application to ecological data.

ABSTRACT: Null models have become a crucial tool for understanding structure within incidence matrices across multiple biological contexts. For example, they have been widely used for the study of ecological and biogeographic questions, testing hypotheses regarding patterns of community assembly, species co-occurrence and biodiversity. However, to our knowledge we remain without a general and flexible approach to study the mechanisms explaining such structures. Here, we provide a method for generating 'correlation-informed' null models, which combine the classic concept of null models and tools from community ecology, like joint statistical modelling. Generally, this model allows us to assess whether the information encoded within any given correlation matrix is predictive for explaining structural

SUBMITTER: Bramon Mora B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6408342 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature