Warming and anthropogenic variables interact to impact dominant animal communities in coral reef ecosystems

Climate warming and human activities independently threaten coral reef ecosystems, yet their combined impacts on reef animal communities remain unclear. Here, we applied environmental DNA (eDNA) surveys across 52 reefs in the South China Sea to examine how fish and invertebrate communities respond to warming, increased resource availability, and heavy metal pollution. Fish communities were more sensitive to warming than invertebrates. Warming reduced dispersal limitation in fish but increased it in invertebrates, indicating divergent assembly mechanisms. The variation of animal community stability driven by warming depends mainly on fish diversity-mediated pathways. Moreover, increased resource availability and heavy metal pollution interacted with warming in opposite directions to influence the stability of dominant animal communities; increased resource availability intensified warming-induced instability. These findings underscore the complex, context-dependent interactions between climate and anthropogenic stressors and highlight the importance of integrating global and local pressures in coral reef conservation efforts.