TY - JOUR
T1 - Investigating the relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem multifunctionality
T2 - Challenges and solutions
AU - Byrnes, Jarrett E.K.
AU - Gamfeldt, Lars
AU - Isbell, Forest
AU - Lefcheck, Jonathan S.
AU - Griffin, John N.
AU - Hector, Andy
AU - Cardinale, Bradley J.
AU - Hooper, David U.
AU - Dee, Laura E.
AU - Emmett Duffy, J.
PY - 2014
Y1 - 2014
N2 - Summary: Extensive research shows that more species-rich assemblages are generally more productive and efficient in resource use than comparable assemblages with fewer species. But the question of how diversity simultaneously affects the wide variety of ecological functions that ecosystems perform remains relatively understudied. It presents several analytical and empirical challenges that remain unresolved. In particular, researchers have developed several disparate metrics to quantify multifunctionality, each characterizing different aspects of the concept and each with pros and cons. We compare four approaches to characterizing multifunctionality and its dependence on biodiversity, quantifying (i) magnitudes of multiple individual functions separately, (ii) the extent to which different species promote different functions, (iii) the average level of a suite of functions and (iv) the number of functions that simultaneously exceeds a critical threshold. We illustrate each approach using data from the pan-European BIODEPTH experiment and the R multifunc package developed for this purpose, evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and implement several methodological improvements. We conclude that an extension of the fourth approach that systematically explores all possible threshold values provides the most comprehensive description of multifunctionality to date. We outline this method and recommend its use in future research.
AB - Summary: Extensive research shows that more species-rich assemblages are generally more productive and efficient in resource use than comparable assemblages with fewer species. But the question of how diversity simultaneously affects the wide variety of ecological functions that ecosystems perform remains relatively understudied. It presents several analytical and empirical challenges that remain unresolved. In particular, researchers have developed several disparate metrics to quantify multifunctionality, each characterizing different aspects of the concept and each with pros and cons. We compare four approaches to characterizing multifunctionality and its dependence on biodiversity, quantifying (i) magnitudes of multiple individual functions separately, (ii) the extent to which different species promote different functions, (iii) the average level of a suite of functions and (iv) the number of functions that simultaneously exceeds a critical threshold. We illustrate each approach using data from the pan-European BIODEPTH experiment and the R multifunc package developed for this purpose, evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and implement several methodological improvements. We conclude that an extension of the fourth approach that systematically explores all possible threshold values provides the most comprehensive description of multifunctionality to date. We outline this method and recommend its use in future research.
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U2 - 10.1111/2041-210X.12143
DO - 10.1111/2041-210X.12143
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:84893926633
SN - 2041-210X
VL - 5
SP - 111
EP - 124
JO - Methods in Ecology and Evolution
JF - Methods in Ecology and Evolution
IS - 2
ER -