Intraspecific predator interference promotes biodiversity in ecosystems

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Kang, Ju, Zhang, Shijie, Niu, Yiyuan, Zhong, Fan, Wang, Xin
Format: Preprint
Published: 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866911007785353216
author Kang, Ju
Zhang, Shijie
Niu, Yiyuan
Zhong, Fan
Wang, Xin
author_facet Kang, Ju
Zhang, Shijie
Niu, Yiyuan
Zhong, Fan
Wang, Xin
contents Explaining biodiversity is a fundamental issue in ecology. A long-standing puzzle lies in the paradox of the plankton: many species of plankton feeding on a limited variety of resources coexist, apparently flouting the competitive exclusion principle (CEP), which holds that the number of predator (consumer) species cannot exceed that of the resources at a steady state. Here, we present a mechanistic model and demonstrate that intraspecific interference among the consumers enables a plethora of consumer species to coexist at constant population densities with only one or a handful of resource species. This facilitated biodiversity is resistant to stochasticity, either with the stochastic simulation algorithm or individual-based modeling. Our model naturally explains the classical experiments that invalidate the CEP, quantitatively illustrates the universal S-shaped pattern of the rank-abundance curves across a wide range of ecological communities, and can be broadly used to resolve the mystery of biodiversity in many natural ecosystems.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2112_05098
institution arXiv
publishDate 2021
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Intraspecific predator interference promotes biodiversity in ecosystems
Kang, Ju
Zhang, Shijie
Niu, Yiyuan
Zhong, Fan
Wang, Xin
Populations and Evolution
Statistical Mechanics
Biological Physics
Explaining biodiversity is a fundamental issue in ecology. A long-standing puzzle lies in the paradox of the plankton: many species of plankton feeding on a limited variety of resources coexist, apparently flouting the competitive exclusion principle (CEP), which holds that the number of predator (consumer) species cannot exceed that of the resources at a steady state. Here, we present a mechanistic model and demonstrate that intraspecific interference among the consumers enables a plethora of consumer species to coexist at constant population densities with only one or a handful of resource species. This facilitated biodiversity is resistant to stochasticity, either with the stochastic simulation algorithm or individual-based modeling. Our model naturally explains the classical experiments that invalidate the CEP, quantitatively illustrates the universal S-shaped pattern of the rank-abundance curves across a wide range of ecological communities, and can be broadly used to resolve the mystery of biodiversity in many natural ecosystems.
title Intraspecific predator interference promotes biodiversity in ecosystems
topic Populations and Evolution
Statistical Mechanics
Biological Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2112.05098