Marine & Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles

Evolutionary Diversity Is Associated With Wood Productivity in Amazonian Forests

Authors

Fernanda Coelho de Souza, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Kyle G. Dexter, University of Edinburgh - United Kingdom; Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh - United Kingdom
Oliver L. Phillips, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
R. Toby Pennington, Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh - United Kingdom; University of Exeter - United Kingdom
Danilo Neves, Federal University of Minas Gerais - Brazil
Martin J. P. Sullivan, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Esteban Alvarez-Davila, Universidad Nacional Abierta y a Distancia - Colombia
Atila Alves, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia - Brazil
Ieda Amaral, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia - Brazil
Ana Andrade, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia - Brazil
Luiz E. O. C. Aragao, University of Exeter - United Kingdom; Brazilian National Institute for Space Research
Alejandro Araujo-Murakami, Universidad Autonoma Gabriel Rene Moreno - Santa Cruz, Bolivia
Eric Arets, Wageningen University - The Netherlands
Luzmilla Arroyo, Universidad Autonoma Gabriel Rene Moreno - Santa Cruz, Bolivia
Gerardo A. Aymard C., UNELLEZ-Guanare - Venezuela
Olaf Banki, Naturalis Biodiversity Center - The Netherlands
Christopher Baraloto, Florida International University
Jorcely Barroso, Universidade Federal do Acre - Brazil
Rene G. A. Boot, Tropenbos International - Wageningen, The Netherlands
Roel J. W. Brienen, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Foster Brown, Woods Hole Research Center
Jose Luis Camargo, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia - Brazil
Wendeson Castro, Universidade Federal do Acre - Brazil
Jerome Chave, Universite Paul Sabatier - Toulouse, France
Alvaro Cogollo, Jardín Botánico de Medellín Joaquín Antonio Uribe - Colombia
James A. Comiskey, United States National Park Service; Smithsonian Institution
Fernando Cornejo Valverde, Proyecto Castana - Madre de Dios, Peru
Antonio Lola da Costa, Universidade Federal do Para - Brazil
Plinio Barbosa de Camargo, Universidade de Sao Paulo - Brazil
Anthony Di Fiore, University of Texas at Austin
Ted R. Feldpausch, University of Exeter - United Kingdom
David Galbraith, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Manuel Gloor, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Rosa C. Goodman, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Martin Gilpin, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Rafael Herrera, Centro de Ecologia IVIC - Venezuela; University of Vienna - Austria
Niro Higuchi, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia (INPA) - Manaus, Brazil
Euridice N. Honorio Coronado, Instituto de Investigaciones de la Amazonia Peruana - Iquitos, Peru
Eliana Jimenez-Rojas, Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Timothy Killeen, AGTECA - Santa Cruz, Bolivia
Susan Laurance, James Cook University - Australia
William Laurance, James Cook University - Australia
Gabriela Lopez-Gonzalez, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
Thomas E. Lovejoy, George Mason University
Yadvinder Malhi, University of Oxford - United Kingdom
Beatriz Marimon, Universidade do Estado de Mato Grosso - Brazil
Ben Hur Marimon Jr., Universidad do Estado de Mato Grosso - Brazil
Casimiro Mendoza, Universidad Mayor de San Simón - Bolivia
Abel Monteagudo-Mendoza, Jardín Botánico de Missouri - Peru
David Neill, Universidad Estatal Amazonica - Puyo, Ecuador
Percy Nunez Vargas, Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco - Peru
Maria C. Penuela-Mora, Universidad Regional Amazonica IKIAM - Ecuador
Georgia C. Pickavance, University of Leeds - United Kingdom
John J. Pipoly III, Broward County Parks & Recreation DivisionFollow
Nigel C. A. Pitman, Duke University
Lourens Poorter, Wageningen University - Netherlands
Adriana Prieto, Universidad Nacional de Colombia - Bogota
Freddy Ramirez, Universidad Nacional de la Amazonia Peruana - Peru
Anand Roopsind, Boise State University
Agustin Rudas, Universidad Nacional de Colombia - Bogota
Rafael P. Salomao, Museu Paraense Emilio Goeldi - Belem, Brazil; Universidade Federal Rural da Amazônia - Brazil
Natalina Silva, Universidade Federal Rural da Amazônia - Brazil
Marcos Silveira, Instituto Federal do Acre - Rio Branco, Brazil
James Singh, Guyana Forestry Commission
Juliana Stropp, Federal University of Alagoas Maceio - Brazil
Hans ter Steege, Naturalis Biodiversity Center - Netherlands; Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam - Netherlands
John Terborgh, University of Florida; James Cook University - Australia
Raquel Thomas-Caesar, Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development - Guyana
Ricardo K. Umetsu, Universidade do Estado de Mato Grosso - Nova Xavantina, Brazil
Rodolfo V. Vasquez, Jardin Botanico de Missouri - Oxapampa, Peru
Ima Célia-Vieira, Museu Paraense Emilio Goeldi - Brazil
Simone A. Vieira, Universidade Estadual de Campinas - Brazil
Vincent Vos, Centro de Investigación y Promoción del Campesinado - La Paz, Bolivia; Universidad Autónoma del Beni José Ballivián - Riberalta, Bolivia
Roderick J. Zagt, Tropenbos International - Wageningen, The Netherlands
Timothy R. Baker, University of Leeds - United Kingdom

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-11-2019

Publication Title

Nature Ecology & Evolution

ISSN

2397-334X

Volume

3

First Page

1754

Last Page

1761

Abstract

Higher levels of taxonomic and evolutionary diversity are expected to maximize ecosystem function, yet their relative importance in driving variation in ecosystem function at large scales in diverse forests is unknown. Using 90 inventory plots across intact, lowland, terra firme, Amazonian forests and a new phylogeny including 526 angiosperm genera, we investigated the association between taxonomic and evolutionary metrics of diversity and two key measures of ecosystem function: aboveground wood productivity and biomass storage. While taxonomic and phylogenetic diversity were not important predictors of variation in biomass, both emerged as independent predictors of wood productivity. Amazon forests that contain greater evolutionary diversity and a higher proportion of rare species have higher productivity. While climatic and edaphic variables are together the strongest predictors of productivity, our results show that the evolutionary diversity of tree species in diverse forest stands also influences productivity. As our models accounted for wood density and tree size, they also suggest that additional, unstudied, evolutionarily correlated traits have significant effects on ecosystem function in tropical forests. Overall, our pan-Amazonian analysis shows that greater phylogenetic diversity translates into higher levels of ecosystem function: tropical forest communities with more distantly related taxa have greater wood productivity.

Comments

©The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited 2019

Additional Comments

NERC grant #s: NE/I028122/1, NE/F005806/1, NE/D005590/1, NE/I028122/1, NE/N012542/1; European Union's Seventh Framework Programme project #s: 283080, 282664

ORCID ID

0000-0002-7977-9496

ResearcherID

C-6533-2012

DOI

10.1038/s41559-019-1007-y

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