Brodie Jedediah F, Mannion Philip D
Division of Biological Sciences & Wildlife Biology Program, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59812, USA; Institute of Biodiversity and Environmental Conservation, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, 94 300 Kota Samarahan, Malaysia.
Department of Earth Sciences, University College London, Gower Street, London, WC1E 6BT, UK.
Trends Ecol Evol. 2023 Jan;38(1):15-23. doi: 10.1016/j.tree.2022.07.013. Epub 2022 Sep 8.
The numerous explanations for why Earth's biodiversity is concentrated at low latitudes fail to explain variation in the strength and even direction of the gradient through deep time. Consequently, we do not know if today's gradient is representative of what might be expected on other planets or is merely an idiosyncrasy of Earth's history. We propose a hierarchy of factors driving the latitudinal distribution of diversity: (i) over geologically long time spans, diversity is largely predicted by climate; (ii) when climatic gradients are shallow, diversity tracks habitat area; and (iii) historical contingencies linked to niche conservatism have geologically short-term, transient influence at most. Thus, latitudinal diversity gradients, although variable in strength and direction, are largely predictable on our planet and possibly others.
关于为何地球生物多样性集中在低纬度地区，有众多解释，但这些解释均无法说明在漫长地质时期内该梯度强度甚至方向的变化情况。因此，我们并不清楚如今的梯度是否代表了其他行星上可能出现的情况，还是仅仅是地球历史的一种特质。我们提出了一系列驱动多样性纬度分布的因素：（i）在地质时间跨度较长的情况下，多样性在很大程度上由气候预测；（ii）当气候梯度较小时，多样性随栖息地面积变化；（iii）与生态位保守性相关的历史偶然性最多只具有地质短期的、短暂的影响。因此，纬度多样性梯度尽管在强度和方向上存在变化，但在我们的星球乃至其他星球上很大程度上是可预测的。
