Research group PLECO (Plants and Ecosystems), Department of Biology, University of Antwerp, Wilrijk, Belgium.
Delegació de la Serralada Litoral Central, ICHN, Mataró, Catalonia, Spain.
Ecol Lett. 2021 Jul;24(7):1375-1386. doi: 10.1111/ele.13752. Epub 2021 Apr 24.
Ecological stoichiometry and studies of biogeochemical niches have mainly focused on plankton and vascular plants, but the phenotypically closest modern relatives of early plants, bryophytes, have been largely neglected. We analysed C:N:P stoichiometries and elemental compositions (K, Na, Mg, Ca, S, Fe) of 35 widely distributed bryophyte species inhabiting springs. We estimated bryophyte C:N:P ratios and their biogeochemical niches, investigated how elementomes respond to the environment and determined whether they tend to diverge more for coexisting than non-coexisting individuals and species. The median C:N:P was 145:8:1, intermediate between Redfield's ratio for marine plankton and those for vascular plants. Biogeochemical niches were differentiated amongst species and were phylogenetically conserved. Differences in individual and species-specific elementomes increased with coexistence between species. Our results provide an evolutionary bridge between the ecological stoichiometries of algae and vascular plants and suggest that differences in elementomes could be used to understand community assemblages and functional diversity.
生态化学计量学和生物地球化学小生境的研究主要集中在浮游生物和维管植物上，但早期植物在表型上最接近的现代亲属——苔藓植物，在很大程度上被忽视了。我们分析了 35 种广泛分布的栖息于泉水中的苔藓物种的 C:N:P 化学计量和元素组成（K、Na、Mg、Ca、S、Fe）。我们估算了苔藓植物的 C:N:P 比及其生物地球化学小生境，研究了元素组如何响应环境，并确定它们是否更倾向于在共存个体和物种之间而不是非共存个体和物种之间出现分歧。中值 C:N:P 为 145:8:1，介于海洋浮游生物的 Redfield 比和维管植物的 Redfield 比之间。生物地球化学小生境在物种间存在差异，并在系统发育上得到保守。个体和物种特异性元素组之间的差异随着物种之间的共存而增加。我们的研究结果在藻类和维管植物的生态化学计量之间提供了一个进化桥梁，并表明元素组的差异可以用来理解群落组合和功能多样性。
