Journal articles: 'Trophic Mutualism'

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Wang, Rong, Xiao-Yong Chen, Yan Chen, Gang Wang, Derek W. Dunn, Rupert J. Quinnell, and Stephen G. Compton. "Loss of top-down biotic interactions changes the relative benefits for obligate mutualists." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 286, no. 1897 (February 20, 2019): 20182501. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.2501.

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The collapse of mutualisms owing to anthropogenic changes is contributing to losses of biodiversity. Top predators can regulate biotic interactions between species at lower trophic levels and may contribute to the stability of such mutualisms, but they are particularly likely to be lost after disturbance of communities. We focused on the mutualism between the fig tree Ficus microcarpa and its host-specific pollinator fig wasp and compared the benefits accrued by the mutualists in natural and translocated areas of distribution. Parasitoids of the pollinator were rare or absent outside the natural range of the mutualists, where the relative benefits the mutualists gained from their interaction were changed significantly away from the plant's natural range owing to reduced seed production rather than increased numbers of pollinator offspring. Furthermore, in the absence of the negative effects of its parasitoids, we detected an oviposition range expansion by the pollinator, with the use of a wider range of ovules that could otherwise have generated seeds. Loss of top-down control has therefore resulted in a change in the balance of reciprocal benefits that underpins this obligate mutualism, emphasizing the value of maintaining food web complexity in the Anthropocene.

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Buzhdygan, O. Y., and S. S. Rudenko. "Multivariate comparison of trophic networks of grassland ecosystems." Ecology and Noospherology 27, no. 1-2 (April 21, 2016): 49–71. http://dx.doi.org/10.15421/031606.

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This article compares 13 network properties of food webs of 31 Ukrainian grasslands. The properties are: network size N, trophic link number L, trophic classes Cl, system connectance C, link density LD, total system throughflow TST, network cycling FCI, ascendency AS, developmental capacity DC, indirect effects dominance IE, system aggradation AI, system synergism SI, and mutualism MI. Our results show these properties are highly correlated and can be aggregated into the three latent factors. The first factor includes N, TST, AS, DC, SI, L, and LD, where network size N appears to be a central defining variable. The second latent factor includes FCI, AI, and Cl, and is driven by indirect effects dominance IE. The third factor includes mutualism MI and connectance C, the last being the driving variable. Network Synergism SI is negatively correlated with the other network properties, while all others are positively intercorrelated. Network connectance appears to be a scale invariant property, while link density is highly sensitive to network size. Our data also show that network mutualism MI is more tied to the network complexity than simply to system scale or number of feeding links.

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Swire, Samuel, Elizabeth Pasipanodya, Manuel A. Morales, and Enrique Peacock-López. "Complex Dynamics in a Minimal Model of Protection-Based Mutualism." Axioms 9, no. 1 (March 2, 2020): 26. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/axioms9010026.

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This paper presents the first five variable model of mutualism motivated by the interaction between ants and homopterans. In this mutualism, homopterans benefit both directly through increased feeding rates and indirectly through predator protection. Results of our analyses show oscillatory, complex, and chaotic dynamic behavior. In addition, we show that intraspecies interactions are crucial for closing trophic levels and stabilizing the dynamic system from potential “chaotic” behavior.

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Jevanandam, Nanthinee, Alexander G. R. Goh, and Richard T. Corlett. "Climate warming and the potential extinction of fig wasps, the obligate pollinators of figs." Biology Letters 9, no. 3 (June 23, 2013): 20130041. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2013.0041.

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Figs ( Ficus ) have a reciprocally obligate mutualism with tiny, short-lived (1–2 days) fig wasps (Agaonidae). The small size and short life of these pollinators is expected to make them more vulnerable to climate change than their larger and longer-lived hosts. We experimentally tested the thermal tolerances of four species of adult female fig wasp from equatorial Singapore. The results suggest that an increase of 3°C or more above the current temperatures experienced across much of the equatorial tropics would markedly decrease the active adult lifespan of all four species. Fig plants are the centre of an intricate web of specialist and generalist animals. Unless fig wasps can acclimate or adapt to warmer temperatures in time, these responses may disrupt the mutualism, potentially affecting multiple trophic levels.

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Schuldt, Andreas, Felix Fornoff, Helge Bruelheide, Alexandra-Maria Klein, and Michael Staab. "Tree species richness attenuates the positive relationship between mutualistic ant–hemipteran interactions and leaf chewer herbivory." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 284, no. 1862 (September 6, 2017): 20171489. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.1489.

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Interactions across trophic levels influence plant diversity effects on ecosystem functions, but the complexity of these interactions remains poorly explored. For example, the interplay between different interactions (e.g. mutualism, predation) might be an important moderator of biodiversity–ecosystem function relationships. We tested for relationships between trophobioses (facultative ant–hemipteran mutualism) and leaf chewer herbivory in a subtropical forest biodiversity experiment. We analysed trophobiosis and herbivory data of more than 10 000 trees along a tree species richness gradient. Against expectations, chewing damage was higher on trees with trophobioses. However, the net positive relationship between trophobioses and overall herbivory depended on tree species richness, being most pronounced at low richness. Our results point to indirect, positive effects of ant-tended sap suckers on leaf chewers, potentially by altering plant defences. Direct antagonistic relationships of trophobiotic ants and leaf-chewing herbivores—frequently reported to drive community-wide effects of trophobioses in other ecosystems—seemed less relevant. However, antagonistic interactions likely contributed to the attenuating effect of tree species richness, because trophobiotic ant and herbivore communities changed from monocultures to species-rich mixtures. Our findings, therefore, suggest that biodiversity loss might lead to complex changes in higher trophic level effects on ecosystem functions, mediated by both trophic and non-trophic interactions.

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Fornoff, Felix, Alexandra-Maria Klein, Nico Blüthgen, and Michael Staab. "Tree diversity increases robustness of multi-trophic interactions." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 286, no. 1898 (March 6, 2019): 20182399. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.2399.

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Multi-trophic interactions maintain critical ecosystem functions. Biodiversity is declining globally, while responses of trophic interactions to biodiversity change are largely unclear. Thus, studying responses of multi-trophic interaction robustness to biodiversity change is crucial for understanding ecosystem functioning and persistence. We investigate plant–Hemiptera (antagonism) and Hemiptera–ant (mutualism) interaction networks in response to experimental manipulation of tree diversity. We show increased diversity at both higher trophic levels (Hemiptera and ants) and increased robustness through redundancy of lower level species of multi-trophic interactions when tree diversity increased. Hemiptera and ant diversity increased with tree diversity through non-additive diversity effects. Network analyses identified that tree diversity also increased the number of tree and Hemiptera species used by Hemiptera and ant species, and decreased the specialization on lower trophic level species in both mutualistic and antagonist interactions. Our results demonstrate that bottom-up effects of tree diversity ascend through trophic levels regardless of interaction type. Thus, local tree diversity is a key driver of multi-trophic community diversity and interaction robustness in forests.

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van der Zee, Els M., Christine Angelini, Laura L. Govers, Marjolijn J. A. Christianen, Andrew H. Altieri, Karin J. van der Reijden, Brian R. Silliman, et al. "How habitat-modifying organisms structure the food web of two coastal ecosystems." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 283, no. 1826 (March 16, 2016): 20152326. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.2326.

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The diversity and structure of ecosystems has been found to depend both on trophic interactions in food webs and on other species interactions such as habitat modification and mutualism that form non-trophic interaction networks. However, quantification of the dependencies between these two main interaction networks has remained elusive. In this study, we assessed how habitat-modifying organisms affect basic food web properties by conducting in-depth empirical investigations of two ecosystems: North American temperate fringing marshes and West African tropical seagrass meadows. Results reveal that habitat-modifying species, through non-trophic facilitation rather than their trophic role, enhance species richness across multiple trophic levels, increase the number of interactions per species (link density), but decrease the realized fraction of all possible links within the food web (connectance). Compared to the trophic role of the most highly connected species, we found this non-trophic effects to be more important for species richness and of more or similar importance for link density and connectance. Our findings demonstrate that food webs can be fundamentally shaped by interactions outside the trophic network, yet intrinsic to the species participating in it. Better integration of non-trophic interactions in food web analyses may therefore strongly contribute to their explanatory and predictive capacity.

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Newton, Adrian C., Bruce D. L. Fitt, Simon D. Atkins, Dale R. Walters, and Tim J. Daniell. "Pathogenesis, parasitism and mutualism in the trophic space of microbe–plant interactions." Trends in Microbiology 18, no. 8 (August 2010): 365–73. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tim.2010.06.002.

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Wang, Bo, Xiang-Zong Geng, Li-Bin Ma, James M. Cook, and Rui-Wu Wang. "A trophic cascade induced by predatory ants in a fig-fig wasp mutualism." Journal of Animal Ecology 83, no. 5 (May 20, 2014): 1149–57. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.12219.

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Yang, Hui, Baptiste Genot, Solange Duhamel, Ryan Kerney, and John A. Burns. "Organismal and cellular interactions in vertebrate–alga symbioses." Biochemical Society Transactions 50, no. 1 (February 28, 2022): 609–20. http://dx.doi.org/10.1042/bst20210153.

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Photosymbioses, intimate interactions between photosynthetic algal symbionts and heterotrophic hosts, are well known in invertebrate and protist systems. Vertebrate animals are an exception where photosynthetic microorganisms are not often considered part of the normal vertebrate microbiome, with a few exceptions in amphibian eggs. Here, we review the breadth of vertebrate diversity and explore where algae have taken hold in vertebrate fur, on vertebrate surfaces, in vertebrate tissues, and within vertebrate cells. We find that algae have myriad partnerships with vertebrate animals, from fishes to mammals, and that those symbioses range from apparent mutualisms to commensalisms to parasitisms. The exception in vertebrates, compared with other groups of eukaryotes, is that intracellular mutualisms and commensalisms with algae or other microbes are notably rare. We currently have no clear cell-in-cell (endosymbiotic) examples of a trophic mutualism in any vertebrate, while there is a broad diversity of such interactions in invertebrate animals and protists. This functional divergence in vertebrate symbioses may be related to vertebrate physiology or a byproduct of our adaptive immune system. Overall, we see that diverse algae are part of the vertebrate microbiome, broadly, with numerous symbiotic interactions occurring across all vertebrate and many algal clades. These interactions are being studied for their ecological, organismal, and cellular implications. This synthesis of vertebrate–algal associations may prove useful for the development of novel therapeutics: pairing algae with medical devices, tissue cultures, and artificial ecto- and endosymbioses.

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Cai, Qiqi, Yiqing Du, Fenghao Qu, and Minghao Wang. "Climate Change and the Change of Trophic Level Interaction in Coral Reefs Based on South China Sea in China." Theoretical and Natural Science 4, no. 1 (April 28, 2023): 246–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.54254/2753-8818/4/20220558.

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In recent years, coral reefs have been seriously affected by human and natural factors, some of influences are even irreversible. Among them, the impacts of climate change have gradually deepened and attracted people's attention. Other papers which tell about the familiar topic failed to focus on discussing specific questions in certain area of coral reefs. The paper mainly analyzes the interspecific relationship change when facing the climate change of coral reef ecology in the South China Sea. Content of this paper first discusses the severe condition of climate change, like the instability of global climate system. Also, the situation about South China Sea and the effects of climate change are discussed and analyzed. Then, the interspecific relationships of predation, competition, parasitism, and mutualism were discussed. Further, discussed the increase of benthic algae and symbiotic organism reactions. The response from higher trophic level to low level and some researches are determined, too. On this basis, consider the interspecific relationships in the same trophic level. In the future, higher trophic level changes should be determined. Also, people should focus on the change after coral reefs recovering from albinism, about whether their population would change even extinct with the effect of climate change on coral reefs and reefs make a response to it through trophic level relationship change. This paper can provide some corresponding research ideas for more future researches.

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BONKOWSKI, M. "Meeting on the Microbiology of Soils, Autumn 2001Protozoa and plant growth: trophic links and mutualism." European Journal of Protistology 37, no. 4 (2002): 363–65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/s0932-4739(04)70032-2.

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13

Gliessman, Stephen R. "Species interactions and community ecology in low external-input agriculture." American Journal of Alternative Agriculture 2, no. 4 (1987): 160–65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0889189300009279.

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AbstractLow external-input agriculture seeks to optimize interactions between species that permit processes at the ecological community level to shift inputs away from nonrenewable or synthetic sources. This goal can be reached through the study of the ecological basis of an array of plant-plant and plant-insect interactions, especially in intercropping systems where particular plant mixtures are of benefit to the entire crop community. These polyculture systems can be managed for nutrient cycling efficiency and pest and disease regulation using knowledge of multi-trophic level interactions and application of recent developments in mutualism and competition theory. A mechanistic model of additive and removal reactions on the environment is proposed as a means of studying species interactions.

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Maccracken, S. Augusta, Ian M. Miller, and Conrad C. Labandeira. "Late Cretaceous domatia reveal the antiquity of plant–mite mutualisms in flowering plants." Biology Letters 15, no. 11 (November 2019): 20190657. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2019.0657.

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Mite houses, or acarodomatia, are found on the leaves of over 2000 living species of flowering plants today. These structures facilitate tri-trophic interactions between the host plant, its fungi or herbivore adversaries, and fungivorous or predaceous mites by providing shelter for the mite consumers. Previously, the oldest acarodomatia were described on a Cenozoic Era fossil leaf dating to 49 Myr in age. Here, we report the first occurrence of Mesozoic Era acarodomatia in the fossil record from leaves discovered in the Upper Cretaceous Kaiparowits Formation (76.6–74.5 Ma) in southern UT, USA. This discovery extends the origin of acarodomatia by greater than 25 Myr, and the antiquity of this plant–mite mutualism provides important constraints for the evolutionary history of acarodomatia on angiosperms.

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Puccinelli, Eleonora, and Christopher D. McQuaid. "Commensalism, antagonism or mutualism? Effects of epibiosis on the trophic relationships of mussels and epibiotic barnacles." Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 540 (July 2021): 151549. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jembe.2021.151549.

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Zhang, Shuang, Yuxin Zhang, and Keming Ma. "Mutualism with aphids affects the trophic position, abundance of ants and herbivory along an elevational gradient." Ecosphere 6, no. 12 (December 2015): art253. http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/es15-00229.1.

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Nelson, Annika S., Riley T. Pratt, Jessica D. Pratt, Richard Alexander Smith, Cole T. Symanski, Cathrine Prenot, and Kailen A. Mooney. "Progressive sensitivity of trophic levels to warming underlies an elevational gradient in ant–aphid mutualism strength." Oikos 128, no. 4 (November 5, 2018): 540–50. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/oik.05650.

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Letourneau, Deborah K., and Jae C. Choe. "Homopteran Attendance by Wasps and Ants: The Stochastic Nature of Interactions." Psyche: A Journal of Entomology 94, no. 1-2 (January 1, 1987): 81–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/1987/12726.

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Associations of Hymenoptera with Homoptera have intrigued ecologists and evolutionary biologists as model systems of mutualism. The extensive body of literature, however, tends to be skewed to the interactions between ants and homopteran trophobionts in the Aphidae or Coccoidea (e.g., Kloft et al. 1965, Nixon 1951, Way 1963, Wilson 1971). In the following account we document a web of multispecies interactions within and between trophic levels, involving a species of wasp, several species of ants, and two species of Homoptera. This account is unique in the literature on Hymenoptera-Homoptera associations because it (1) addresses observable interference between hymenopteran attendants, (2) reports behavioral preference by homopterans for certain hymenopreran attendants, and (3) describes an interaction between a polistine wasp and an aetalionid planthopper. In addition, this study has general implications about the quality of diffuse and multiple associations between Homoptera and their honeydew foragers.

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DiRoberts, LE, A. Dudek, NE Ray, RW Fulweiler, and RD Rotjan. "Testing assumptions of nitrogen cycling between a temperate, model coral host and its facultative symbiont: symbiotic contributions to dissolved inorganic nitrogen assimilation." Marine Ecology Progress Series 670 (July 22, 2021): 61–74. http://dx.doi.org/10.3354/meps13731.

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Coral symbioses are predicated on the need for mutual nutrient acquisition and translocation between partners. Carbon translocation is well-studied in this classic mutualism, while nitrogen (N) has received comparatively less attention. Quantifying the mechanisms and dynamics of N assimilation is critical to understanding the functional ecology of coral organisms. Given the importance of symbiosis to the coral holobiont, it is important to determine what role photosynthetic symbionts play in N acquisition. We used the facultatively symbiotic temperate coral Astrangia poculata and 15N labeling to test the effects of symbiotic state and trophic status on N acquisition. We tracked assimilation of 2 forms of isotopically labeled dissolved inorganic N (DIN: ammonium, 15NH4+ and nitrate, 15NO3-) by fed and starved colonies of both symbiotic and aposymbiotic A. poculata. Coral holobiont tissue was subsequently analyzed for δ15N and changes in photosynthetic efficiency. Results suggest that corals acquired the most N from DIN via their symbiont Breviolum psygmophilum and that NH4+ is more readily assimilated than NO3-. Photosynthetic efficiency increased with the addition of NH4+, but only for fed, symbiotic treatments. NO3- adversely affected photosynthetic efficiency among starved corals. Our results suggest that symbiosis is advantageous for DIN acquisition, that dysbiosis inhibits corals’ mixotrophic strategy of nutrient acquisition, and that either feeding or symbiosis alone does not fully provide the energetic advantage of both. This study lends support to the emerging hypothesis that symbionts are mutualists in optimal conditions but shift to a parasitic paradigm when resources or energy are scarce.

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Crabb, Beau A., and Olle Pellmyr. "Impact of the Third Trophic Level in an Obligate Mutualism: Do Yucca Plants Benefit from Parasitoids of Yucca Moths?" International Journal of Plant Sciences 167, no. 1 (January 2006): 119–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/497844.

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Defossez, Emmanuel, Champlain Djiéto-Lordon, Doyle McKey, Marc-André Selosse, and Rumsaïs Blatrix. "Plant-ants feed their host plant, but above all a fungal symbiont to recycle nitrogen." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 278, no. 1710 (October 27, 2010): 1419–26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2010.1884.

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In ant–plant symbioses, plants provide symbiotic ants with food and specialized nesting cavities (called domatia). In many ant–plant symbioses, a fungal patch grows within each domatium. The symbiotic nature of the fungal association has been shown in the ant-plant Leonardoxa africana and its protective mutualist ant Petalomyrmex phylax . To decipher trophic fluxes among the three partners, food enriched in 13 C and 15 N was given to the ants and tracked in the different parts of the symbiosis up to 660 days later. The plant received a small, but significant, amount of nitrogen from the ants. However, the ants fed more intensively the fungus. The pattern of isotope enrichment in the system indicated an ant behaviour that functions specifically to feed the fungus. After 660 days, the introduced nitrogen was still present in the system and homogeneously distributed among ant, plant and fungal compartments, indicating efficient recycling within the symbiosis. Another experiment showed that the plant surface absorbed nutrients (in the form of simple molecules) whether or not it is coated by fungus. Our study provides arguments for a mutualistic status of the fungal associate and a framework for investigating the previously unsuspected complexity of food webs in ant–plant mutualisms.

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Marquis, Michael, Israel Del Toro, and Shannon L. Pelini. "Insect mutualisms buffer warming effects on multiple trophic levels." Ecology 95, no. 1 (January 2014): 9–13. http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/13-0760.1.

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Knight, Tiffany M., Jonathan M. Chase, Helmut Hillebrand, and Robert D. Holt. "Predation on mutualists can reduce the strength of trophic cascades." Ecology Letters 9, no. 11 (November 2006): 1173–78. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1461-0248.2006.00967.x.

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Morales, Manuel A., William F. Morris, and William G. Wilson. "Allee dynamics generated by protection mutualisms can drive oscillations in trophic cascades." Theoretical Ecology 1, no. 2 (October 2, 2007): 77–88. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12080-007-0006-9.

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Renner, Susanne S., and Constantin M. Zohner. "Climate Change and Phenological Mismatch in Trophic Interactions Among Plants, Insects, and Vertebrates." Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 49, no. 1 (November 2, 2018): 165–82. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110617-062535.

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Phenological mismatch results when interacting species change the timing of regularly repeated phases in their life cycles at different rates. We review whether this continuously ongoing phenomenon, also known as trophic asynchrony, is becoming more common under ongoing rapid climate change. In antagonistic trophic interactions, any mismatch will have negative impacts for only one of the species, whereas in mutualistic interactions, both partners are expected to suffer. Trophic mismatch is therefore expected to last for evolutionarily short periods, perhaps only a few seasons, adding to the difficulty of attributing it to climate change, which requires long-term data. So far, the prediction that diverging phenologies linked to climate change will cause mismatch is most clearly met in antagonistic interactions at high latitudes in the Artic. There is limited evidence of phenological mismatch in mutualistic interactions, possibly because of strong selection on mutualists to have co-adapted phenological strategies. The study of individual plasticity, population variation, and the genetic bases for phenological strategies is in its infancy. Recent work on woody plants revealed the large imprint of historic climate change on temperature, chilling, and day-length thresholds used by different species to synchronize their phenophases, which in the Northern Hemisphere has led to biogeographic phenological regions in which long-lived plants have adapted to particular interannual and intermillennial amplitudes of climate change.

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Le Provost, Gaëtane, Isabelle Badenhausser, Yoann Le Bagousse-Pinguet, Yann Clough, Laura Henckel, Cyrille Violle, Vincent Bretagnolle, Marilyn Roncoroni, Peter Manning, and Nicolas Gross. "Land-use history impacts functional diversity across multiple trophic groups." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 3 (January 6, 2020): 1573–79. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1910023117.

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Land-use change is a major driver of biodiversity loss worldwide. Although biodiversity often shows a delayed response to land-use change, previous studies have typically focused on a narrow range of current landscape factors and have largely ignored the role of land-use history in shaping plant and animal communities and their functional characteristics. Here, we used a unique database of 220,000 land-use records to investigate how 20-y of land-use changes have affected functional diversity across multiple trophic groups (primary producers, mutualists, herbivores, invertebrate predators, and vertebrate predators) in 75 grassland fields with a broad range of land-use histories. The effects of land-use history on multitrophic trait diversity were as strong as other drivers known to impact biodiversity, e.g., grassland management and current landscape composition. The diversity of animal mobility and resource-acquisition traits was lower in landscapes where much of the land had been historically converted from grassland to crop. In contrast, functional biodiversity was higher in landscapes containing old permanent grasslands, most likely because they offer a stable and high-quality habitat refuge for species with low mobility and specialized feeding niches. Our study shows that grassland-to-crop conversion has long-lasting impacts on the functional biodiversity of agricultural ecosystems. Accordingly, land-use legacy effects must be considered in conservation programs aiming to protect agricultural biodiversity. In particular, the retention of permanent grassland sanctuaries within intensive landscapes may offset ecological debts.

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Moreira, Xoaquín, and Kailen A. Mooney. "Influence of plant genetic diversity on interactions between higher trophic levels." Biology Letters 9, no. 3 (June 23, 2013): 20130133. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2013.0133.

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While the ecological consequences of plant diversity have received much attention, the mechanisms by which intraspecific diversity affects associated communities remains understudied. We report on a field experiment documenting the effects of patch diversity in the plant Baccharis salicifolia (genotypic monocultures versus polycultures of four genotypes), ants (presence versus absence) and their interaction on ant-tended aphids, ants and parasitic wasps, and the mechanistic pathways by which diversity influences their multi-trophic interactions. Five months after planting, polycultures (versus monocultures) had increased abundances of aphids (threefold), ants (3.2-fold) and parasitoids (1.7-fold) owing to non-additive effects of genetic diversity. The effect on aphids was direct, as plant genetic diversity did not mediate ant–aphid, parasitoid–aphid or ant–parasitoid interactions. This increase in aphid abundance occurred even though plant growth (and thus aphid resources) was not higher in polycultures. The increase in ants and parasitoids was an indirect effect, due entirely to higher aphid abundance. Ants reduced parasitoid abundance by 60 per cent, but did not affect aphid abundance or plant growth, and these top-down effects were equivalent between monocultures and polycultures. In summary, intraspecific plant diversity did not increase primary productivity, but nevertheless had strong effects across multiple trophic levels, and effects on both herbivore mutualists and enemies could be predicted entirely as an extension of plant–herbivore interactions.

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Dharampal, Prarthana S., Caitlin Carlson, Cameron R. Currie, and Shawn A. Steffan. "Pollen-borne microbes shape bee fitness." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 286, no. 1904 (June 12, 2019): 20182894. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.2894.

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Teeming within pollen provisions are diverse communities of symbiotic microbes, which provide a variety of benefits to bees. Microbes themselves may represent a major dietary resource for developing bee larvae. Despite their apparent importance in sustaining bee health, evidence linking pollen-borne microbes to larval health is currently lacking. We examined the effects of microbe-deficient diets on the fitness of larval mason bees. In a series of diet manipulations, microbe-rich maternally collected pollen provisions were replaced with increasing fractions of sterilized, microbe-deficient pollen provisions before being fed to developing larvae. Convergent findings from amino acid and fatty acid trophic biomarker analyses revealed that larvae derived a substantial amount of nutrition from microbial prey and occupied a significantly higher trophic position than that of strict herbivores. Larvae feeding on increasingly sterile diets experienced significant adverse effects on growth rates, biomass and survivorship. When completely deprived of pollen-borne microbes, larvae consistently exhibited marked decline in fitness. We conclude that microbes associated with aged pollen provisions are central to bee health, not only as nutritional mutualists, but also as a major dietary component. In an era of global bee decline, the conservation of such bee–microbe interactions may represent an important facet of pollinator protection strategies.

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Queiroz, Renan Batista, Philip Donkersley, Fábio Nascimento Silva, Issa Hashil Al-Mahmmoli, Abdullah Mohammed Al-Sadi, Claudine Márcia Carvalho, and Simon L. Elliot. "Invasive mutualisms between a plant pathogen and insect vectors in the Middle East and Brazil." Royal Society Open Science 3, no. 12 (December 2016): 160557. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.160557.

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Complex multi-trophic interactions in vectorborne diseases limit our understanding and ability to predict outbreaks. Arthropod-vectored pathogens are especially problematic, with the potential for novel interspecific interactions during invasions. Variations and novelties in plant–arthropod–pathogen triumvirates present significant threats to global food security. We examined aspects of a phytoplasma pathogen of citrus across two continents. ‘ Candidatus Phytoplasma aurantifolia’ causes Witches' Broom Disease of Lime (WBDL) and has devastated citrus production in the Middle East. A variant of this phytoplasma currently displays asymptomatic or ‘silent’ infections in Brazil. We first studied vector capacity and fitness impacts of the pathogen on its vectors. The potential for co-occurring weed species to act as pathogen reservoirs was analysed and key transmission periods in the year were also studied. We demonstrate that two invasive hemipteran insects— Diaphorina citri and Hishimonus phycitis —can vector the phytoplasma. Feeding on phytoplasma-infected hosts greatly increased reproduction of its invasive vector D. citri both in Oman and Brazil; suggesting that increased fitness of invasive insect vectors thereby further increases the pathogen's capacity to spread. Based on our findings, this is a robust system for studying the effects of invasions on vectorborne diseases and highlights concerns about its spread to warmer, drier regions of Brazil.

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Bracewell, R. R., D. Vanderpool, J. M. Good, and D. L. Six. "Cascading speciation among mutualists and antagonists in a tree–beetle–fungi interaction." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 285, no. 1881 (June 27, 2018): 20180694. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.0694.

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Cascading speciation is predicted to occur when multiple interacting species diverge in parallel as a result of divergence in one species promoting adaptive differentiation in other species. However, there are few examples where ecological interactions among taxa have been shown to result in speciation that cascades across multiple trophic levels. Here, we test for cascading speciation occurring among the western pine beetle ( Dendroctonus brevicomis ), its primary host tree ( Pinus ponderosa ), and the beetle's fungal mutualists ( Ceratocystiopsis brevicomi and Entomocorticium sp. B). We assembled genomes for the beetle and a fungal symbiont and then generated reduced representation genomic data (RADseq) from range-wide samples of these three interacting species. Combined with published data for the host tree, we present clear evidence that the tree, the beetle, and the fungal symbionts are all genetically structured into at least two distinct groups that have strongly codiverged with geographical isolation. We then combine our genomic results with diverse population and laboratory-based data to show evidence for reproductive isolation at each level of the cascade and for coevolution of both antagonistic and mutualistic species interactions within this complex network.

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Duque-Gamboa, Diana Nataly, Anderson Arenas Clavijo, Andres Posso-Terranova, and Nelson Toro-Perea. "Mutualistic interaction of aphids and ants in pepper, Capsicum annuum and Capsicum frutenscens (Solanaceae)." Revista de Biología Tropical 69, no. 2 (May 7, 2021): 626–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.15517/rbt.v69i2.43429.

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Introduction: Adequate biological identification is fundamental for establishing integrated pest management programs and identifying the trophic and mutualist relationships that can affect pest population dynamics. Aphids are the main pest of pepper Capsicum spp. (Solanaceae) crops in Southwestern Colombia, due to their role as vectors of viruses. However, the identification of aphid species is complex, limiting the investigations performed to address their interactions with other organisms. Ants and aphids present a facultative mutualistic relationship, that promotes the growth of hemipteran colonies, for this reason, the study of the ecological mutualistic association between aphids and ants is important. Objective: The main objective was to discriminate the aphid species present in commercial crops of Capsicum spp., and to identify the ant community that attends the aphid colonies and its effects on the size of the aphid colonies. Methods: Aphid species, and their ant mutualist, were collected from Capsicum annuum and Capsicum frutescens, in the Cauca valley, Southwestern Colombia. We use the DNA barcoding approach to identify aphid species, and the ants were identified by morphology‐based taxonomy. To evaluate the effect of ant care on the size and structure of aphid colonies, generalized linear models were calculated using as the response variables the total number of aphids for each colony and the proportion of nymphs. Results: The aphid species that attack pepper crops, are: Aphis gossypii and Myzus persicae (Hemiptera: Aphididae), with A. gossypii being the species that interacts with ants (19 ant species). A. gossypii colonies attended by ants had larger sizes and more nymphs per colony, than those not attended. Conclusions: Although the aphid-ant interaction is not species-specific, it is necessary to consider its role in the propagation of viral diseases in peppers and to determine how this interaction may affect regional biological control strategies.

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Gerhold, Pille, Marcos B. Carlucci, Şerban Procheş, and Andreas Prinzing. "The Deep Past Controls the Phylogenetic Structure of Present, Local Communities." Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 49, no. 1 (November 2, 2018): 477–97. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110617-062348.

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Coexisting species may be evolutionarily proximate or distant, resulting in phylogenetically poor or rich communities. This variation is often considered to result from present assembly processes. We argue that, under certain conditions, deep-past processes might control the phylogenetic diversity of communities. First, deep-past effects involve macroevolutionary processes, such as diversification rate, niche conservatism, or dispersal, in the lineages that constitute communities. Second, deep-past processes in the respective region or in the habitat type play a role, for instance, through age, area, stability, or connectivity. Third, the deep past may affect communities via trophic interactions (i.e., communities of enemies or mutualists or communities of hosts). We suggest that deep-past effects can be identified in local communities by measuring phylogenetic diversity in different species pools. We also show how community phylogenetic diversity results in positive or negative eco-evolutionary feedback, and we identify present-day conservation challenges that may profit from a deep-time perspective.

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Pilon-Smits, Elizabeth A. H. "On the Ecology of Selenium Accumulation in Plants." Plants 8, no. 7 (June 30, 2019): 197. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants8070197.

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Plants accumulate and tolerate Se to varying degrees, up to 15,000 mg Se/kg dry weight for Se hyperaccumulators. Plant Se accumulation may exert positive or negative effects on other species in the community. The movement of plant Se into ecological partners may benefit them at low concentrations, but cause toxicity at high concentrations. Thus, Se accumulation can protect plants against Se-sensitive herbivores and pathogens (elemental defense) and reduce surrounding vegetation cover via high-Se litter deposition (elemental allelopathy). While hyperaccumulators negatively impact Se-sensitive ecological partners, they offer a niche for Se-tolerant partners, including beneficial microbial and pollinator symbionts as well as detrimental herbivores, pathogens, and competing plant species. These ecological effects of plant Se accumulation may facilitate the evolution of Se resistance in symbionts. Conversely, Se hyperaccumulation may evolve driven by increasing Se resistance in herbivores, pathogens, or plant neighbors; Se resistance also evolves in mutualist symbionts, minimizing the plant’s ecological cost. Interesting topics to address in future research are whether the ecological impacts of plant Se accumulation may affect species composition across trophic levels (favoring Se resistant taxa), and to what extent Se hyperaccumulators form a portal for Se into the local food chain and are important for Se cycling in the local ecosystem.

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Nadra, María Gabriela, Norberto Pedro Giannini, Juan Manuel Acosta, and Lone Aagesen. "Evolution of pollination by frugivorous birds in Neotropical Myrtaceae." PeerJ 6 (August 27, 2018): e5426. http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5426.

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Bird pollination is relatively common in the tropics, and especially in the Americas. In the predominantly Neotropical tribe Myrteae (Myrtaceae), species of two genera,AccaandMyrrhinium, offer fleshy, sugary petals to the consumption of birds that otherwise eat fruits, thus pollinating the plants in an unusual plant-animal interaction. The phylogenetic position of these genera has been problematic, and therefore, so was the understanding of the evolution of this interaction. Here we include new sequences ofMyrrhinium atropurpureumin a comprehensive molecular phylogeny based on a balanced sample of two plastid and two nuclear markers, with the aim of providing the historical framework of pollination by frugivorous birds in Myrteae. We developed 13 flower and inflorescence characters that comprehensively depict the macroscopic morphological components of this interaction. Bayesian and parsimony phylogenies concur in placing bothAccaandMyrrhiniumin a clade withPsidiumspecies; withMyrrhiniumsister toPsidium. Mapping of morphological characters indicated some degree of convergence (e.g., fleshy petals, purplish display) but also considerable divergence in key characters that point to rather opposing pollination strategies and also different degrees of specialization inAccaversusMyrrhinium. Pollination by frugivorous birds represents a special case of mutualism that highlights the evolutionary complexities of plant-animal interactions.

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Wielgoss, Arno, Teja Tscharntke, Alfianus Rumede, Brigitte Fiala, Hannes Seidel, Saleh Shahabuddin, and Yann Clough. "Interaction complexity matters: disentangling services and disservices of ant communities driving yield in tropical agroecosystems." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 281, no. 1775 (January 22, 2014): 20132144. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2013.2144.

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Owing to complex direct and indirect effects, impacts of higher trophic levels on plants is poorly understood. In tropical agroecosystems, ants interact with crop mutualists and antagonists, but little is known about how this integrates into the final ecosystem service, crop yield. We combined ant exclusion and introduction of invasive and native-dominant species in cacao agroecosystems to test whether (i) ant exclusion reduces yield, (ii) dominant species maximize certain intermediate ecosystem services (e.g. control of specific pests) rather than yield, which depends on several, cascading intermediate services and (iii) even, species-rich ant communities result in highest yields. Ants provided services, including reduced leaf herbivory and fruit pest damage and indirect pollination facilitation, but also disservices, such as increased mealybug density, phytopathogen dissemination and indirect pest damage enhancement. Yields were highest with unmanipulated, species-rich, even communities, whereas ant exclusion decreased yield by 27%. Introduction of an invasive-dominant ant decreased species density and evenness and resulted in 34% lower yields, whereas introduction of a non-invasive-dominant species resulted in similar species density and yields as in the unmanipulated control. Species traits and ant community structure affect services and disservices for agriculture in surprisingly complex ways, with species-rich and even communities promoting highest yield.

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Litsios, Glenn, Anna Kostikova, and Nicolas Salamin. "Host specialist clownfishes are environmental niche generalists." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 281, no. 1795 (November 22, 2014): 20133220. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2013.3220.

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Why generalist and specialist species coexist in nature is a question that has interested evolutionary biologists for a long time. While the coexistence of specialists and generalists exploiting resources on a single ecological dimension has been theoretically and empirically explored, biological systems with multiple resource dimensions (e.g. trophic, ecological) are less well understood. Yet, such systems may provide an alternative to the classical theory of stable evolutionary coexistence of generalist and specialist species on a single resource dimension. We explore such systems and the potential trade-offs between different resource dimensions in clownfishes. All species of this iconic clade are obligate mutualists with sea anemones yet show interspecific variation in anemone host specificity. Moreover, clownfishes developed variable environmental specialization across their distribution. In this study, we test for the existence of a relationship between host-specificity (number of anemones associated with a clownfish species) and environmental-specificity (expressed as the size of the ecological niche breadth across climatic gradients). We find a negative correlation between host range and environmental specificities in temperature, salinity and pH, probably indicating a trade-off between both types of specialization forcing species to specialize only in a single direction. Trade-offs in a multi-dimensional resource space could be a novel way of explaining the coexistence of generalist and specialists.

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Perkovsky, Evgeny, and Piotr Wegierek. "Aphid–Buchnera–Ant symbiosis; or why are aphids rare in the tropics and very rare further south?" Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 107, no. 2-3 (June 2016): 297–310. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s1755691017000147.

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ABSTRACTAt least since the Cretaceous Terrestrial Revolution, the geographical distribution of aphids, particularly in the Northern Hemisphere, has been strongly affected by the low thermal tolerance of their obligatory bacterial symbiont, Buchnera aphidicola, which was why the aphids switched to obligate parthenogenesis in low latitudes. Hormaphidids and greenideids penetrated into the tropics only after the Oligocene strengthening of climate seasonality, and specialisations of the tropical representatives of these families did not allow them to spread further south (in the case of cerataphidines), or only allowed in few cases (in the case of greenideids).Aphids suffered from the Mesozoic–Cenozoic boundary extinction event much more strongly than other insects. The extinction was roughly coincidental with the establishment of the tight symbiosis of aphids with formicine and dolichoderine ants, which was accompanied by the flourishing of all three groups.In the Cretaceous, all of the representatives of extant and subfamilies occupied positions that were subordinate to Armaniinae and Sphecomyrminae. Prior to large ant colonies evolving their efficient ant–aphid mutualism, the aphids remained unprotected before the growing ant predation. The origin of the aphid trophobiosis with large colonies of Formicinae and Dolichoderinae has resulted in the steep decline of aphids left beyond that ant–aphid symbiotic network. By at least the basal Eocene (unlike the Late Cretaceous), ant proportions in the entomofauna increased sharply, and evident dominants emerged. Even now, aphid milkers from small colonies (hundreds of specimens) never protect their symbionts, and homopteran-tending ants are more likely to be dominant, with large colonies of 104–105 workers.The mutualistic ant–aphid system failed to cross the tropical belt during the Cenozoic because of Buchnera's low heat tolerance. As a result, the native southern temperate aphid fauna consists now of seven genera only, five of which are Late Cretaceous relicts. Some of them had relatives in Late Cretaceous amber of the Northern Hemisphere.

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Shaver, Elizabeth C., and Brian R. Silliman. "Time to cash in on positive interactions for coral restoration." PeerJ 5 (June 22, 2017): e3499. http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.3499.

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Coral reefs are among the most biodiverse and productive ecosystems on Earth, and provide critical ecosystem services such as protein provisioning, coastal protection, and tourism revenue. Despite these benefits, coral reefs have been declining precipitously across the globe due to human impacts and climate change. Recent efforts to combat these declines are increasingly turning to restoration to help reseed corals and speed-up recovery processes. Coastal restoration theory and practice has historically favored transplanting designs that reduce potentially harmful negative species interactions, such as competition between transplants. However, recent research in salt marsh ecosystems has shown that shifting this theory to strategically incorporate positive interactions significantly enhances restoration yield with little additional cost or investment. Although some coral restoration efforts plant corals in protected areas in order to benefit from the facilitative effects of herbivores that reduce competitive macroalgae, little systematic effort has been made in coral restoration to identify the entire suite of positive interactions that could promote population enhancement efforts. Here, we highlight key positive species interactions that managers and restoration practitioners should utilize to facilitate the restoration of corals, including (i) trophic facilitation, (ii) mutualisms, (iii) long-distance facilitation, (iv) positive density-dependence, (v) positive legacy effects, and (vi) synergisms between biodiversity and ecosystem function. As live coral cover continues to decline and resources are limited to restore coral populations, innovative solutions that increase efficiency of restoration efforts will be critical to conserving and maintaining healthy coral reef ecosystems and the human communities that rely on them.

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Sakai, Shoko, Soeren Metelmann, Yukihiko Toquenaga, and Arndt Telschow. "Geographical variation in the heterogeneity of mutualistic networks." Royal Society Open Science 3, no. 6 (June 2016): 150630. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.150630.

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Plant–animal mutualistic networks are characterized by highly heterogeneous degree distributions. The majority of species interact with few partner species, while a small number are highly connected to form network hubs that are proposed to play an important role in community stability. It has not been investigated, however, if or how the degree distributions vary among types of mutualisms or communities, or between plants and animals in the same network. Here, we evaluate the degree distributions of pollination and seed-dispersal networks, which are two major types of mutualistic networks that have often been discussed in parallel, using an index based on Pielou's evenness. Among 56 pollination networks we found strong negative correlation of the heterogeneity between plants and animals, and geographical shifts of network hubs from plants in temperate regions to animals in the tropics. For 28 seed-dispersal networks, by contrast, the correlation was positive, and there is no comparable geographical pattern. These results may be explained by evolution towards specialization in the presence of context-dependent costs that occur if plants share the animal species as interaction partner. How the identity of network hubs affects the stability and resilience of the community is an important question for future studies.

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Kharwar, Ravindra N., Vijay K. Sharma, Ashish Mishra, Jitendra Kumar, Dheeraj K. Singh, Satish K. Verma, Surendra K. Gond, et al. "Harnessing the Phytotherapeutic Treasure Troves of the Ancient Medicinal Plant Azadirachta indica (Neem) and Associated Endophytic Microorganisms." Planta Medica 86, no. 13/14 (March 3, 2020): 906–40. http://dx.doi.org/10.1055/a-1107-9370.

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Azadirachta indica, commonly known as neem, is an evergreen tree of the tropics and sub-tropics native to the Indian subcontinent with demonstrated ethnomedicinal value and importance in agriculture as well as in the pharmaceutical industry. This ancient medicinal tree, often called the “wonder tree”, is regarded as a chemical factory of diverse and complex compounds with a plethora of structural scaffolds that is very difficult to mimic by chemical synthesis. Such multifaceted chemical diversity leads to a fantastic repertoire of functional traits, encompassing a wide variety of biological activity and unique modes of action against specific and generalist pathogens and pests. Until now, more than 400 compounds have been isolated from different parts of neem including important bioactive secondary metabolites such as azadirachtin, nimbidin, nimbin, nimbolide, gedunin, and many more. In addition to its insecticidal property, the plant is also known for antimicrobial, antimalarial, antiviral, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, antipyretic, hypoglycaemic, antiulcer, antifertility, anticarcinogenic, hepatoprotective, antioxidant, anxiolytic, molluscicidal, acaricidal, and antifilarial properties. Notwithstanding the chemical and biological virtuosity of neem, it has also been extensively explored for associated microorganisms, especially a class of mutualists called endophytic microorganisms (or endophytes). More than 30 compounds, including neem “mimetic” compounds, have been reported from endophytes harbored in the neem trees in different ecological niches. In this review, we provide an informative and in-depth overview of the topic that can serve as a point of reference for an understanding of the functions and applications of a medicinal plant such as neem, including associated endophytes, within the overall theme of phytopathology. Our review further exemplifies the already-noted current surge of interest in plant and microbial natural products for implications both within the ecological and clinical settings, for a more secure and sustainable future.

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Hall, Rea Maria, Bernhard Urban, and Hans-Peter Kaul. "The management success of the invasive late goldenrod (Solidago gigantea Aiton.) in a nature conservation area is strongly related to site, control measures and environmental factors." PeerJ 10 (April 19, 2022): e13161. http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.13161.

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The late goldenrod (Soldiago gigantea Aiton; Asteraceae) is one of the most abundant invasive species in various types of habitats. Its long-creeping plagiotropic rhizomes enable the plant to build up dense, monospecific stands within a short time. Particularly in nature conservation areas, the invasion of goldenrod can cause severe disruptions in the naturally occuring mutualims between plants, insects and higher trophic levels, subsequently impeding the achievement of nature conservation goals. As management options of goldenrod in nature conservation areas are limited, this three-year study aimed to test the effectiveness of three management treatments (two-time mowing, triticale cultivation, and reverse rotary cutting) on four different sites in the Austrian Donau-Auen National Park. The number and height of goldenrod shoots were recorded three times a year on twelve permanent trial plots on each site to test for the effectiveness of the treatments. In addition, vegetation surveys were performed to observe the recovery potential of native plant species. Even though the three-years mowing and the triticale cultivation reduced goldenrod by 95.6% and 97.2% resp., we could find no relation between the effectiveness of the treatment and the intensity of disturbance created by the control option. On the contrary, with a reduction of only 5.4% in goldenrod density the most intensive treatment, the rotary cutting, showed the lowest efficiency. The highest positive effect on the re-establishment of native plant species was recorded with two mowing events per year. Even though the study revealed that certain management options have the potential to effectively reduce goldenrod and to simultaneously increase the establishment success of native species, results can only be seen as so-called snapshots. For example, as shown on site EJW one unforeseeable wild boar digging event transformed a 84.5% reduction into a 4.7% increase in goldenrod density. Therefore, a proper and regular monitoring is essential to be able to react to the effects of unpredictable events that can have severe impact on vegetation dynamics.

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CORLETT, RICHARD T. "Pollination in a degraded tropical landscape: a Hong Kong case study." Journal of Tropical Ecology 17, no. 1 (January 2001): 155–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0266467401001109.

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Although the pollination biology of many individual plant species has been investigated in the Oriental region, there have been very few community-level studies. The two most comprehensive of these were in the primary mixed dipterocarp forest of Lambir Hills National Park, Sarawak (4°20′N: Momose et al. 1998, Sakai et al. 1999) and in the warm temperate evergreen broad-leaved forest and cool temperate mixed forest on Yakushima Island (30°N: Yumoto 1987, 1988). Hong Kong (22°17′N) lies midway between these sites, at the northern margin of the tropics, where winter temperatures fall below 10 °C at sea-level for a few days every year and there are occasional frosts above 400 m (Dudgeon & Corlett 1994). Latitudinal effects, however, are compounded in comparisons with other well-studied East Asian sites, by centuries of massive human impact, leaving a degraded landscape of steep, eroded hillsides, covered in fire-maintained grassland, secondary shrublands and, locally, secondary forests (Zhuang & Corlett 1997). This history has left a relatively impoverished fauna but a surprisingly diverse flora, including 400 native tree species (Corlett & Turner 1997). In these circumstances, failures of pollination and dispersal mutualisms might be expected to accelerate the loss of plant species from the landscape (Bond 1994, Kearns & Inouye 1997). Previous studies have shown that most woody vegetation in Hong Kong is dominated by species whose seeds can be dispersed by the commonest avian frugivores, the light-vented and red-whiskered bulbuls (Pycnonotus sinensis (Gmelin) and P. jocosus (Linn.)) and the Japanese white-eye (Zosterops japonicus Swinhoe) (Corlett 1996, 1998), but there is no equivalent information available on pollination biology.

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Hui, Cang, David M. Richardson, Pietro Landi, Henintsoa O. Minoarivelo, Helen E. Roy, Guillaume Latombe, Xin Jing, et al. "Trait positions for elevated invasiveness in adaptive ecological networks." Biological Invasions 23, no. 6 (February 23, 2021): 1965–85. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10530-021-02484-w.

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AbstractOur ability to predict the outcome of invasion declines rapidly as non-native species progress through intertwined ecological barriers to establish and spread in recipient ecosystems. This is largely due to the lack of systemic knowledge on key processes at play as species establish self-sustaining populations within the invaded range. To address this knowledge gap, we present a mathematical model that captures the eco-evolutionary dynamics of native and non-native species interacting within an ecological network. The model is derived from continuous-trait evolutionary game theory (i.e., Adaptive Dynamics) and its associated concept of invasion fitness which depicts dynamic demographic performance that is both trait mediated and density dependent. Our approach allows us to explore how multiple resident and non-native species coevolve to reshape invasion performance, or more precisely invasiveness, over trait space. The model clarifies the role of specific traits in enabling non-native species to occupy realised opportunistic niches. It also elucidates the direction and speed of both ecological and evolutionary dynamics of residing species (natives or non-natives) in the recipient network under different levels of propagule pressure. The versatility of the model is demonstrated using four examples that correspond to the invasion of (i) a horizontal competitive community; (ii) a bipartite mutualistic network; (iii) a bipartite antagonistic network; and (iv) a multi-trophic food web. We identified a cohesive trait strategy that enables the success and establishment of non-native species to possess high invasiveness. Specifically, we find that a non-native species can achieve high levels of invasiveness by possessing traits that overlap with those of its facilitators (and mutualists), which enhances the benefits accrued from positive interactions, and by possessing traits outside the range of those of antagonists, which mitigates the costs accrued from negative interactions. This ‘central-to-reap, edge-to-elude’ trait strategy therefore describes the strategic trait positions of non-native species to invade an ecological network. This model provides a theoretical platform for exploring invasion strategies in complex adaptive ecological networks.

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Leroy, Céline, Nathalie Séjalon-Delmas, Alain Jauneau, Mario-Xavier Ruiz-González, Hervé Gryta, Patricia Jargeat, Bruno Corbara, Alain Dejean, and Jérôme Orivel. "Trophic mediation by a fungus in an ant-plant mutualism." Journal of Ecology, December 2010, no. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2745.2010.01763.x.

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Clark, T. J., Jason Newton, and Ewan D. Wakefield. "Comment on “Evidence of prehistoric human activity in the Falkland Islands”." Science Advances 8, no. 17 (April 29, 2022). http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abo0928.

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Stable isotopes from archaic Falkland Islands wolves ( Dusicyon australis ) indicate a high trophic, marine diet. Hamley et al. argue that this is consistent with mutualism with Yaghan people. However, most D. australis had similar isotopic signatures in the European era, despite human persecution. These data therefore neither support nor refute human-mediated introduction of D. australis to the Falklands.

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Hamley, Kit M., Jacquelyn L. Gill, Kathryn E. Krasinski, Dulcinea V. Groff, Brenda L. Hall, Daniel H. Sandweiss, John R. Southon, Paul Brickle, and Thomas V. Lowell. "Response to comment on “Evidence of prehistoric human activity in the Falkland Islands”." Science Advances 8, no. 17 (April 29, 2022). http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abo6765.

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Hamley et al . previously presented multiple lines of evidence that people were present in the Falkland Islands before Europeans and may have brought the now-extinct canid, Dusicyon australis . Stable isotope data reported by Clark et al . indicate that D. australis had a high-trophic, marine diet that terrestrialized following European arrival. This is consistent with our hypothesis of a human mutualism.

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Prada, Fiorella, Silvia Franzellitti, Erik Caroselli, Itay Cohen, Mauro Marini, Alessandra Campanelli, Lorenzo Sana, et al. "Acclimatization of a coral-dinoflagellate mutualism at a CO2 vent." Communications Biology 6, no. 1 (January 18, 2023). http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s42003-022-04327-3.

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AbstractOcean acidification caused by shifts in ocean carbonate chemistry resulting from increased atmospheric CO2 concentrations is threatening many calcifying organisms, including corals. Here we assessed autotrophy vs heterotrophy shifts in the Mediterranean zooxanthellate scleractinian coral Balanophyllia europaea acclimatized to low pH/high pCO2 conditions at a CO2 vent off Panarea Island (Italy). Dinoflagellate endosymbiont densities were higher at lowest pH Sites where changes in the distribution of distinct haplotypes of a host-specific symbiont species, Philozoon balanophyllum, were observed. An increase in symbiont C/N ratios was observed at low pH, likely as a result of increased C fixation by higher symbiont cell densities. δ13C values of the symbionts and host tissue reached similar values at the lowest pH Site, suggesting an increased influence of autotrophy with increasing acidification. Host tissue δ15N values of 0‰ strongly suggest that diazotroph N2 fixation is occurring within the coral tissue/mucus at the low pH Sites, likely explaining the decrease in host tissue C/N ratios with acidification. Overall, our findings show an acclimatization of this coral-dinoflagellate mutualism through trophic adjustment and symbiont haplotype differences with increasing acidification, highlighting that some corals are capable of acclimatizing to ocean acidification predicted under end-of-century scenarios.

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WANG Qing, 王庆, 卢志兴 LU Zhixing, 赵婧文 ZHAO Jingwen, and 陈又清 CHEN Youqing. "The impact path and intensity of mutualism and plant diversity on different trophic levels of arthropod community." Acta Ecologica Sinica 40, no. 1 (2020). http://dx.doi.org/10.5846/stxb201811062407.

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Khramov, Alexander V., Tatiana Foraponova, and Piotr Węgierek. "The earliest pollen-loaded insects from the Lower Permian of Russia." Biology Letters 19, no. 3 (March 2023). http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0523.

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Recent fossil discoveries suggest that the coevolution of insect pollinators and gymnosperms started long before the appearance of flowering plants. One of the keys to understanding the origins of pollination relationships is fossil insects with gymnosperm pollen attached to the body surface. Such fossils are exceedingly rare to find, especially from the Palaeozoic, a time when ambers with insect inclusions were absent. Here, we report compression fossils of Early Permian tillyardembiid insects (Polyneoptera) preserved with pollen on their heads, thoraces, legs and abdomens. This is the earliest finding of pollen-bearing insects, predating the previous oldest record from the Middle Jurassic by ca 120 Ma. Judging by the pollen composition, tillyardembiids visited a narrow range of host plants, including Rufloriaceae (Cordaitales). While it is impossible to say for certain whether tillyardembiids as pollen consumers contributed to pollination, a trophic specialization of this kind could be considered an evolutionary precursor of pollination mutualism.

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Saint-Béat, Blanche, Brian D. Fath, Cyril Aubry, Jonathan Colombet, Julie Dinasquet, Louis Fortier, Virginie Galindo, et al. "Contrasting pelagic ecosystem functioning in eastern and western Baffin Bay revealed by trophic network modeling." Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene 8 (January 1, 2020). http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/elementa.397.

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Baffin Bay, located at the Arctic Ocean’s ‘doorstep’, is a heterogeneous environment where a warm and salty eastern current flows northwards in the opposite direction of a cold and relatively fresh Arctic current flowing along the west coast of the bay. This circulation affects the physical and biogeochemical environment on both sides of the bay. The phytoplanktonic species composition is driven by its environment and, in turn, shapes carbon transfer through the planktonic food web. This study aims at determining the effects of such contrasting environments on ecosystem structure and functioning and the consequences for the carbon cycle. Ecological indices calculated from food web flow values provide ecosystem properties that are not accessible by direct in situ measurement. From new biological data gathered during the Green Edge project, we built a planktonic food web model for each side of Baffin Bay, considering several biological processes involved in the carbon cycle, notably in the gravitational, lipid, and microbial carbon pumps. Missing flow values were estimated by linear inverse modeling. Calculated ecological network analysis indices revealed significant differences in the functioning of each ecosystem. The eastern Baffin Bay food web presents a more specialized food web that constrains carbon through specific and efficient pathways, leading to segregation of the microbial loop from the classical grazing chain. In contrast, the western food web showed redundant and shorter pathways that caused a higher carbon export, especially via lipid and microbial pumps, and thus promoted carbon sequestration. Moreover, indirect effects resulting from bottom-up and top-down control impacted pairwise relations between species differently and led to the dominance of mutualism in the eastern food web. These differences in pairwise relations affect the dynamics and evolution of each food web and thus might lead to contrasting responses to ongoing climate change.

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Journal articles on the topic 'Trophic Mutualism'

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