Ecology and Biodiversity, Department of Biology, Utrecht University, Padualaan 8, NL-3584 CH, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Biological Sciences, Faculty of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Institute for Life Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK.
Nat Commun. 2017 Oct 27;8(1):1161. doi: 10.1038/s41467-017-01350-5.
In peatland ecosystems, plant communities mediate a globally significant carbon store. The effects of global environmental change on plant assemblages are expected to be a factor in determining how ecosystem functions such as carbon uptake will respond. Using vegetation data from 56 Sphagnum-dominated peat bogs across Europe, we show that in these ecosystems plant species aggregate into two major clusters that are each defined by shared response to environmental conditions. Across environmental gradients, we find significant taxonomic turnover in both clusters. However, functional identity and functional redundancy of the community as a whole remain unchanged. This strongly suggests that in peat bogs, species turnover across environmental gradients is restricted to functionally similar species. Our results demonstrate that plant taxonomic and functional turnover are decoupled, which may allow these peat bogs to maintain ecosystem functioning when subject to future environmental change.
在泥炭地生态系统中，植物群落调节着具有全球重要意义的碳储量。预计全球环境变化对植物组合的影响将成为决定生态系统功能（如碳吸收）如何响应的一个因素。利用来自欧洲 56 个以泥炭藓为主的泥炭沼泽的植被数据，我们表明，在这些生态系统中，植物物种聚集为两个主要的聚类，每个聚类都由对环境条件的共同反应来定义。在环境梯度上，我们发现两个聚类都有显著的分类转变。然而，整个群落的功能身份和功能冗余保持不变。这强烈表明，在泥炭沼泽中，跨越环境梯度的物种更替仅限于功能相似的物种。我们的研究结果表明，植物分类和功能转变是脱钩的，这可能使这些泥炭沼泽在未来面临环境变化时能够维持生态系统功能。
