Increasing the number of stressors reduces soil ecosystem services worldwide.

ABSTRACT: Increasing the number of environmental stressors could decrease ecosystem functioning in soils. Yet this relationship has never been globally assessed outside laboratory experiments. Here, using two independent global standardized field surveys, and a range of natural and human factors, we test the relationship between the number of environmental stressors exceeding different critical thresholds and the maintenance of multiple ecosystem services across biomes. Our analysis shows that, multiple stressors, from medium levels (>50%), negatively and significantly correlates with impacts on ecosystem services, and that multiple stressors crossing a high-level critical threshold (over 75% of maximum observed levels), reduces soil biodiversity and functioning globally. The number of environmental

SUBMITTER: Rillig MC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7614524 | biostudies-literature | 2023 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature