Dataset Information

Global and regional erosion of mammalian functional diversity across the diel cycle.

ABSTRACT: Biodiversity is declining worldwide. When species are physically active (i.e., their diel niche) may influence their risk of becoming functionally extinct. It may also affect how species losses affect ecosystems. For 5033 terrestrial mammals, we predict future changes to diel global and local functional diversity through a gradient of progressive functional extinction scenarios of threatened species. Across scenarios, diurnal species were at greater risk of becoming functionally extinct than nocturnal, crepuscular, and cathemeral species, resulting in deep functional losses in global diurnal trait space. Redundancy (species with similar roles) will buffer global nocturnal functional diversity; however, across the land surface, losses will mostly occur among functionally dispersed species (species with distinct roles). Functional extinctions will constrict boundaries of cathemeral trait space as megaherbivores, and arboreal foragers are lost. Variation in the erosion of functional diversity across the daily cycle will likely profoundly affect the partitioning of ecosystem functioning between night and day.

SUBMITTER: Cox DTC

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9374345 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Global and regional erosion of mammalian functional diversity across the diel cycle.

Cox Daniel T C DTC Gardner Alexandra S AS Gaston Kevin J KJ

Science advances 20220812 32

Biodiversity is declining worldwide. When species are physically active (i.e., their diel niche) may influence their risk of becoming functionally extinct. It may also affect how species losses affect ecosystems. For 5033 terrestrial mammals, we predict future changes to diel global and local functional diversity through a gradient of progressive functional extinction scenarios of threatened species. Across scenarios, diurnal species were at greater risk of becoming functionally extinct than noc ...[more]

PMID: 35960803

Similar Datasets

Project description:The Anthropocene epoch is partly defined by anthropogenic spread of crops beyond their centres of origin. At global scales, evidence indicates that species-level taxonomic diversity of crops being cultivated on large-scale agricultural lands has increased linearly over the past 50 years. Yet environmental and socio-economic differences support expectations that temporal changes in crop diversity vary across regions. Ecological theory also suggests that changes in crop taxonomic diversity may not necessarily reflect changes in the evolutionary diversity of crops. We used data from the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) of the United Nations to assess changes in crop taxonomic- and phylogenetic diversity across 22 subcontinental-scale regions from 1961-2014. We document certain broad consistencies across nearly all regions: i) little change in crop diversity from 1961 through to the late 1970s; followed by ii) a 10-year period of sharp diversification through the early 1980s; followed by iii) a "levelling-off" of crop diversification beginning in the early 1990s. However, the specific onset and duration of these distinct periods differs significantly across regions and are unrelated to agricultural expansion, indicating that unique policy or environmental conditions influence the crops being grown within a given region. Additionally, while the 1970s and 1980s are defined by region-scale increases in crop diversity this period marks the increasing dominance of a small number of crop species and lineages; a trend resulting in detectable increases in the similarity of crops being grown across regions. Broad similarities in the species-level taxonomic and phylogenetic diversity of crops being grown across regions, primarily at large industrial scales captured by FAO data, represent a unique feature of the Anthropocene epoch. Yet nuanced asymmetries in regional-scale trends suggest that environmental and socio-economic factors play a key role in shaping observed macro-ecological changes in the plant diversity on agricultural lands.

Project description:AimTo define biome-scale hotspots of phylogenetic and functional mammalian biodiversity (PD and FD, respectively) and compare them to 'classical' hotspots based on species richness (SR) only.LocationGlobal.MethodsSR, PD & FD were computed for 782 terrestrial ecoregions using distribution ranges of 4616 mammalian species. We used a set of comprehensive diversity indices unified by a recent framework that incorporates the species relative coverage in each ecoregion. We build large-scale multifaceted diversity-area relationships to rank ecoregions according to their levels of biodiversity while accounting for the effect of area on each diversity facet. Finally we defined hotspots as the top-ranked ecoregions.ResultsWhile ignoring species relative coverage led to a relative good congruence between biome top ranked SR, PD and FD hotspots, ecoregions harboring a rich and abundantly represented evolutionary history and functional diversity did not match with top ranked ecoregions defined by species richness. More importantly PD and FD hotspots showed important spatial mismatches. We also found that FD and PD generally reached their maximum values faster than species richness as a function of area.Main conclusionsThe fact that PD/FD reach faster their maximal value than SR may suggest that the two former facets might be less vulnerable to habitat loss than the latter. While this point is expected, it is the first time that it is quantified at global scale and should have important consequences in conservation. Incorporating species relative coverage into the delineation of multifaceted hotspots of diversity lead to weak congruence between SR, PD and FD hotspots. This means that maximizing species number may fail at preserving those nodes (in the phylogenetic or functional tree) that are relatively abundant in the ecoregion. As a consequence it may be of prime importance to adopt a multifaceted biodiversity perspective to inform conservation strategies at global scale.

Dataset Information

Global and regional erosion of mammalian functional diversity across the diel cycle.

Publications

Global and regional erosion of mammalian functional diversity across the diel cycle.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets