| 1. |
- Soininen, Janne, et al.
(författare)
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Toward More Integrated Ecosystem Research in Aquatic and Terrestrial Environments
- 2015
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Ingår i: BioScience. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0006-3568 .- 1525-3244. ; 65:2, s. 174-182
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems are tightly linked through the fluxes of organisms and matter. However, aquatic and terrestrial ecologists have mainly studied these ecosystems separately, a "splendid isolation" historically fostered by disciplinary boundaries between institutes and funding schemes. Here, we synthesize the progress made in joint aquatic and terrestrial research and suggest new approaches to meeting future research challenges in changing environments. Aquatic and terrestrial organisms use cross-system subsidies to a comparable extent and addressing reciprocal subsidies is therefore necessary in order to understand biodiversity and functioning of both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. We suggest that the metaecosystem framework could be expanded to explicitly consider cross-system fluxes of matter differing in magnitude and quality. We further advocate the inclusion of cross-system analyses at broader spatial extents, for which remote-sensing applications would be a useful tool in environmental research at the land-water interface. A cross-ecosystem approach would therefore be valuable for a more thorough understanding of ecosystem responses to various stressors in the face of rapid environmental change.
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| 2. |
- Virta, Leena, et al.
(författare)
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The diversity of benthic diatoms affects ecosystem productivity in heterogeneous coastal environments
- 2019
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Ingår i: Ecology. - : Wiley. - 0012-9658 .- 1939-9170. ; 100:9
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The current decrease in biodiversity affects all ecosystems, and the impacts of diversity on ecosystem functioning need to be resolved. So far, marine studies about diversity-ecosystem productivity-relationships have concentrated on small-scale, controlled experiments, with often limited relevance to natural ecosystems. Here, we provide a real-world study on the effects of microorganismal diversity (measured as the diversity of benthic diatom communities) on ecosystem productivity (using chlorophyll a concentration as a surrogate) in a heterogeneous marine coastal archipelago. We collected 78 sediment cores at 17 sites in the northern Baltic Sea and found exceptionally high diatom diversity (328 observed species). We used structural equation models and quantile regression to explore relationships between diatom diversity and productivity. Previous studies have found contradictory results in the relationship between microorganismal diversity and ecosystem productivity, but we showed a linear and positive basal relationship between diatom diversity and productivity, which indicates that diatom diversity most likely forms the lowest boundary for productivity. Thus, although productivity can be high even when diatom diversity is low, high diatom diversity supports high productivity. The trait composition was more effective than taxonomical composition in showing such a relationship, which could be due to niche complementarity. Our results also indicated that environmental heterogeneity leads to substantial patchiness in the diversity of benthic diatom communities, mainly induced by the variation in sediment organic matter content. Therefore, future changes in precipitation and river runoff and associated changes in the quality and quantity of organic matter in the sea, will also affect diatom communities and, hence, ecosystem productivity. Our study suggests that benthic microorganisms are vital for ecosystem productivity, and together with the substantial heterogeneity of coastal ecosystems, they should be considered when evaluating the potential productivity of coastal areas.
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