Dataset Information

A millennium of increasing diversity of ecosystems until the mid-20th century.

ABSTRACT: Land-use change is widely regarded as a simplifying and homogenising force in nature. In contrast, analysing global land-use reconstructions from the 10th to 20th centuries, we found progressive increases in the number, evenness, and diversity of ecosystems (including human-modified land-use types) present across most of the Earth's land surface. Ecosystem diversity increased more rapidly after ~1700 CE, then slowed or slightly declined (depending on the metric) following the mid-20th century acceleration of human impacts. The results also reveal increasing spatial differentiation, rather than homogenisation, in both the presence-absence and area-coverage of different ecosystem types at sub-global scales-at least, prior to the mid-20th century. Nonetheless, geographic homogenization was revealed for a subset of analyses at a global scale, reflecting the now-global presence of certain human-modified ecosystem types. Our results suggest that, while human land-use changes have caused declines in relatively undisturbed or "primary" ecosystem types, they have also driven increases in ecosystem diversity over the last millennium.

SUBMITTER: Martins IS

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9543278 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

A millennium of increasing diversity of ecosystems until the mid-20th century.

Martins Inês S IS Dornelas Maria M Vellend Mark M Thomas Chris D CD

Global change biology 20220722 20

Land-use change is widely regarded as a simplifying and homogenising force in nature. In contrast, analysing global land-use reconstructions from the 10th to 20th centuries, we found progressive increases in the number, evenness, and diversity of ecosystems (including human-modified land-use types) present across most of the Earth's land surface. Ecosystem diversity increased more rapidly after ~1700 CE, then slowed or slightly declined (depending on the metric) following the mid-20th century ac ...[more]

PMID: 35808866

Similar Datasets

Project description:Seagrass meadows store globally significant organic carbon (Corg ) stocks which, if disturbed, can lead to CO2 emissions, contributing to climate change. Eutrophication and thermal stress continue to be a major cause of seagrass decline worldwide, but the associated CO2 emissions remain poorly understood. This study presents comprehensive estimates of seagrass soil Corg erosion following eutrophication-driven seagrass loss in Cockburn Sound (23 km2 between 1960s and 1990s) and identifies the main drivers. We estimate that shallow seagrass meadows (<5 m depth) had significantly higher Corg stocks in 50 cm thick soils (4.5 ± 0.7 kg Corg /m2 ) than previously vegetated counterparts (0.5 ± 0.1 kg Corg /m2 ). In deeper areas (>5 m), however, soil Corg stocks in seagrass and bare but previously vegetated areas were not significantly different (2.6 ± 0.3 and 3.0 ± 0.6 kg Corg /m2 , respectively). The soil Corg sequestration capacity prevailed in shallow and deep vegetated areas (55 ± 11 and 21 ± 7 g Corg m-2 year-1 , respectively), but was lost in bare areas. We identified that seagrass canopy loss alone does not necessarily drive changes in soil Corg but, when combined with high hydrodynamic energy, significant erosion occurred. Our estimates point at ~0.20 m/s as the critical shear velocity threshold causing soil Corg erosion. We estimate, from field studies and satellite imagery, that soil Corg erosion (within the top 50 cm) following seagrass loss likely resulted in cumulative emissions of 0.06-0.14 Tg CO2-eq over the last 40 years in Cockburn Sound. We estimated that indirect impacts (i.e. eutrophication, thermal stress and light stress) causing the loss of ~161,150 ha of seagrasses in Australia, likely resulted in the release of 11-21 Tg CO2 -eq since the 1950s, increasing cumulative CO2 emissions from land-use change in Australia by 1.1%-2.3% per annum. The patterns described serve as a baseline to estimate potential CO2 emissions following disturbance of seagrass meadows.

Dataset Information

A millennium of increasing diversity of ecosystems until the mid-20th century.

Publications

A millennium of increasing diversity of ecosystems until the mid-20th century.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets