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Related Concept Videos

What is Biodiversity?01:19

What is Biodiversity?

Biodiversity describes the variety of living things at multiple organizational levels: genetic, species and ecosystem diversity. Species diversity includes all branches of the evolutionary tree from single-celled prokaryotic organisms, bacteria, and archaea, to the eukaryotic kingdoms: plants; animals; fungi; and protists. To date, there have been about 1.75 million species identified, and new species are discovered every week.
Biodiversity and Human Values01:24

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Human civilization relies on biodiversity in many ways. Sudden changes in species biodiversity result in environmental changes that can modify weather patterns and therefore human civilizations.
Keystone Species01:39

Keystone Species

Measures of species biodiversity, such as richness (i.e., the number of species present) and evenness (i.e., their relative abundance), describe an ecological community’s structure. Many factors affect community structure, including abiotic factors (e.g., sunlight and nutrients), disturbances (e.g., fire or flood), species interactions (e.g., predation or competition), and chance events (e.g., foreign species invasion). Certain species—such as keystone species—also play a pivotal role in the...
Ecological Disturbance02:26

Ecological Disturbance

An ecological disturbance is a temporary disruption in the environment resulting from abiotic, biotic, or anthropogenic factors, causing a pronounced change in an ecosystem. The impact of an ecological disturbance, which can depend on its intensity, frequency, and spatial distribution, plays a significant role in shaping the species diversity within the ecosystem.Ecological disturbances can be caused by an event as small as the trampling of underbrush to an incident as wide-ranging as a forest...
Threats to Biodiversity01:50

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There have been five major extinction events throughout geological history, resulting in the elimination of biodiversity, followed by a rebound of species that adapted to the new conditions. In the current geological epoch, the Holocene, there is a sixth extinction event in progress. This mass extinction has been attributed to human activities and is thus provisionally called the Anthropocene. In 2019 the human population reached 7.7 billion people and is projected to comprise 10 billion by...
What is an Ecosystem?01:17

What is an Ecosystem?

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JenaTron - An Experimental Approach to Study the Effects of Plant History and Soil History on Grassland Ecosystem Functioning
09:23

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Multiple functions increase the importance of biodiversity for overall ecosystem functioning.

Lars Gamfeldt1, Helmut Hillebrand, Per R Jonsson

  • 1Department of Marine Ecology, Göteborg University, Tjärnö Marine Biological Laboratory, SE-452 96 Strömstad, Sweden. lars.gamfeldt@marecol.gu.se

Ecology
|June 12, 2008
PubMed
Summary

Biodiversity loss impacts overall ecosystem functioning more than single functions due to multifunctional complementarity. Protecting species diversity is crucial for maintaining ecosystem services and health.

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Area of Science:

  • Ecology
  • Conservation Biology
  • Ecosystem Science

Background:

  • Biodiversity is linked to ecosystem functions, but studies often examine single functions or variables.
  • The role of species in performing multiple functions simultaneously is often overlooked in biodiversity-ecosystem function research.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To propose a conceptual model exploring how species loss affects overall ecosystem functioning, considering multiple functions.
  • To investigate the impact of species loss on overall ecosystem functioning, defined as the joint effect of multiple functions.

Main Methods:

  • Developed a conceptual model to assess the effects of species loss on overall ecosystem functioning.
  • Utilized five empirical datasets on monocultures to model relationships between species richness and overall ecosystem functioning.
  • Analyzed correlations across functions and redundancy within functions.

Main Results:

  • Overall ecosystem functioning is more vulnerable to species loss than individual functions due to multifunctional complementarity.
  • Empirical data supported the model's predictions regarding the effects of species loss on multiple functions.
  • Multifunctional redundancy was generally lower than single-function redundancy in the studied datasets.

Conclusions:

  • Shifting focus to the variety of functions maintained by diverse species reveals the full importance of biodiversity for ecosystem functioning.
  • Findings underscore the significance of biodiversity for conservation and management of biota and ecosystem services.
  • Multifunctional complementarity highlights the critical need to conserve species diversity for ecosystem stability and services.