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7 - Biodiversity scaling relationships: are microorganisms fundamentally different?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2012

By
Jessica Green  and
Brendan J. M. Bohannan
Edited by
David Storch ,
Pablo Marquet  and
James Brown
Jessica Green
Affiliation:
University of California, Merced
Brendan J. M. Bohannan
Affiliation:
University of Oregon
David Storch
Affiliation:
Charles University, Prague
Pablo Marquet
Affiliation:
Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
James Brown
Affiliation:
University of New Mexico
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Summary

Introduction

One of the key goals of ecology is to understand the spatial scaling of species diversity. Spatial patterns of species diversity provide important clues about the underlying mechanisms that regulate biodiversity and are central in the development of biodiversity theory (MacArthur & Wilson, 1967; Rosenzweig, 1995; Brown, 1995; Gaston & Blackburn, 2000; Hubbell, 2001; Holyoak, Leibold & Holt, 2005). Assumptions regarding the spatial scaling of biodiversity are a fundamental component of conservation biology and are frequently used to identify local- and global-scale priority conservation areas (Ferrier et al., 2004; Desmet & Cowling, 2004) and to predict extinction risk due to climate change (Thomas et al., 2004) and habitat loss (Gaston, Blackburn & Goldewijk, 2003). Although scaling patterns have been documented in hundreds of studies of plant and animal diversity, such patterns in microbial species (i.e. bacteria, archaea, and single-celled eukarya) have not been well documented. This is a serious omission, given that microorganisms may comprise much of Earth's biodiversity (Whitman, Coleman & Wiebe, 1998; Torsvik, Ovreas & Thingstad, 2002) and play critical roles in biogeochemical cycling and ecosystem functioning (Balser, 2000; Wardle, 2002; Morin & McGrady-Steed, 2004). Furthermore, microbial biodiversity is a major source of novel pharmaceuticals and other compounds of industrial importance, and an understanding of the scaling of microbial biodiversity is crucial to the search for such compounds (Bull, 2004).

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Scaling Biodiversity , pp. 129 - 149
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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