16.8.2011: Forschung CH

Ökosystemleistungen: (Fast) jede Art zählt

Services écosystémiques: (presque) chaque espèce compte


Isabell Forest et al.

Forschende haben für unterschiedliche Jahre, Orte, Ökosystemprozesse und Szenarien des globalen Wandels untersucht, wie viel Vielfalt nötig ist, um die Ökosystemprozesse am Laufen zu halten. Dazu wurden die Ergebnisse zahlreicher Biodiversitäts-Experimente neu analysiert. Die Resultate verblüffen: 84 Prozent aller 147 untersuchten Pflanzenarten fördern ökologische Prozesse. Dies zeigt, dass in einer Welt, die sich immer schneller wandelt, deutlich mehr Biodiversität notwendig ist, um das Funktionieren von Ökosystemen zu gewährleisten.

Des scientifiques ont analysé la quantité de diversité nécessaire pour conserver les processus des écosystèmes, ceci au cours de différentes années, dans divers lieux, pour différents processus écosystémiques et scénari touchant aux changements globaux. De nombreux résultats d’expérimentations sur la biodiversité ont été réexaminé dans cet objectif. Les résultats sont stupéfiants: 84 pourcent des 147 espèces de plantes étudiées favorisent les processus écologiques. Celà montre qu'une bien plus haute biodiversité est nécessaire pour garantir le fonctionnement des écosystèmes dans un monde qui se transforme toujours plus rapidement.


Biodiversity is rapidly declining worldwide, and there is consensus that this can decrease ecosystem functioning and services. It remains unclear, though, whether few or many of the species in an ecosystem are needed to sustain the provisioning of ecosystem services. It has been hypothesized that most species would promote ecosystem services if many times, places, functions and environmental changes were considered; however, no previous study has considered all of these factors together. Here we show that 84% of the 147 grassland plant species studied in 17 biodiversity experiments promoted ecosystem functioning at least once. Different species promoted ecosystem functioning during different years, at different places, for different functions and under different environmental change scenarios. Furthermore, the species needed to provide one function during multiple years were not the same as those needed to provide multiple functions within one year. Our results indicate that even more species will be needed to maintain ecosystem functioning and services than previously suggested by studies that have either (1) considered only the number of species needed to promote one function under one set of environmental conditions, or (2) separately considered the importance of biodiversity for providing ecosystem functioning across multiple years, places, functions or environmental change scenarios. Therefore, although species may appear functionally redundant when one function is considered under one set of environmental conditions, many species are needed to maintain multiple functions at multiple times and places in a changing world.

Keywords:
Ökosystemleistungen, Ökosystemprozesse, globaler Wandel, Biodiversitäts-Experimente

Art der Publikation:
Fachpublikation

Literatur:
Forest I. et al. 2011: High plant diversity is needed to maintain ecosystem services. Nature. DOI: 10.1038/nature10282. Published online 10. August 2011.

Kontaktadresse:
Prof. Bernhard Schmid
Institute of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies
Universität Zürich
Winterthurerstrasse 190
CH-8057 Zürich

bernhard.schmid@ieu.uzh.ch
Tel: +41 (0)44 635 52 05


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