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Evolution in metacommunities.

Charles J Goodnight1

  • 1Department of Biology, University of Vermont, 120 MLS, Burlington, VT 05401, USA. charles.goodnight@uvm.edu

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences
|March 30, 2011
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Evolution in connected ecosystems (metacommunities) can be driven by community selection, where entire communities evolve. This process is influenced by migration patterns, particularly multi-species migrations, and is significant in laboratory settings.

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Area of Science:

  • Ecology
  • Evolutionary Biology
  • Theoretical Ecology

Background:

  • Metacommunities are collections of local communities linked by migration.
  • Evolution within metacommunities is influenced by both within-community and among-community processes.
  • Among-community processes include divergent selection and community-level selection, dependent on migration patterns.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To explore the evolutionary dynamics within metacommunities.
  • To investigate the role of different migration models (migrant pool, single-species propagule pool, multi-species propagule pool) on community evolution.
  • To assess the potential effectiveness of community selection as an evolutionary force.

Main Methods:

  • Theoretical modeling of metacommunity dynamics.
  • Review of experimental studies on community selection.
  • Analysis of how migration patterns influence evolutionary outcomes.

Main Results:

  • Community selection can be a potent evolutionary force, acting through genetic changes within species or shifts in community composition.
  • The multi-species propagule pool model presents a particularly interesting scenario for community evolution.
  • Laboratory studies demonstrate the importance of community selection.

Conclusions:

  • Community selection is a significant evolutionary mechanism, especially under specific migration regimes like multi-species propagule pools.
  • While proven in lab settings, the prevalence and impact of community selection in natural populations require further investigation.
  • Understanding metacommunity dynamics is crucial for comprehending large-scale evolutionary processes.