Abstract
Unlike plants and vertebrates, the ecological preferences, and potential vulnerabilities of soil invertebrates to environmental change, remain poorly understood in terrestrial ecosystems globally. We conducted a cross-biome survey including 83 locations across six continents to advance our understanding of the ecological preferences and vulnerabilities of the diversity of dominant and functionally important soil invertebrate taxa, including nematodes, arachnids and rotifers. The diversity of invertebrates was analyzed through amplicon sequencing. Vegetation and climate drove the diversity and dominant taxa of soil invertebrates. Our results suggest that declines in forest cover and plant diversity, and reductions in plant production associated with increases in aridity, can result in reductions of the diversity of soil invertebrates in a drier and more managed world. We further developed global atlases of the diversity of these important soil invertebrates, which were cross-validated using an independent database. Our study advances the current knowledge of the ecological preferences and vulnerabilities of the diversity and presence of functionally important soil invertebrates in soils from across the globe. This information is fundamental for improving and prioritizing conservation efforts of soil genetic resources and management policies.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 752-761 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Molecular Ecology |
| Volume | 29 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Feb 1 2020 |
Funding
This project received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 702057. F.B. and A.G. thank the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities and FEDER funds for the CICYT project AGL2017-85755-R and CGL2017-88124-R. F.B. and C.G. thanks CSIC for the Intramural grant 201740I008 and the I-Link+2018 (LINKA20069) grant, and Fundación Séneca from Murcia province (19896/GERM/15). M.D.-B. acknowledges support from the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions of the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme H2020-MSCA-IF-2016 under REA grant agreement n°702057. S.A. and F.D.A. were supported by FONDECYT 1170995. CAP is grateful to IAI-CRN 3005. C.A.P., and F.D.A. were supported by PFB-23 (from CONICYT) and P05-002 (from Millennium Scientific Initiative) to the Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity, Chile. Noah Fierer, Mathew A. Bowker, Asmeret A. Berhe, Nick A. Cutler, Patrick E. Hayes, Zeng Y. Hseu, M. Kirchmair, Hans Lambers, Sigrid Neuhauser, Victor M. Peña-Ramírez, Sasha C. Reed, Christina Siebe and Benjamin W. Sullivan are acknowledged for their contribution with soil samples. This project received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska‐Curie grant agreement No 702057. F.B. and A.G. thank the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities and FEDER funds for the CICYT project AGL2017‐85755‐R and CGL2017‐88124‐R. F.B. and C.G. thanks CSIC for the Intramural grant 201740I008 and the I‐Link+2018 (LINKA20069) grant, and Fundación Séneca from Murcia province (19896/GERM/15). M.D.‐B. acknowledges support from the Marie Sklodowska‐Curie Actions of the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme H2020‐MSCA‐IF‐2016 under REA grant agreement n°702057. S.A. and F.D.A. were supported by FONDECYT 1170995. CAP is grateful to IAI‐CRN 3005. C.A.P., and F.D.A. were supported by PFB‐23 (from CONICYT) and P05‐002 (from Millennium Scientific Initiative) to the Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity, Chile. Noah Fierer, Mathew A. Bowker, Asmeret A. Berhe, Nick A. Cutler, Patrick E. Hayes, Zeng Y. Hseu, M. Kirchmair, Hans Lambers, Sigrid Neuhauser, Victor M. Peña‐Ramírez, Sasha C. Reed, Christina Siebe and Benjamin W. Sullivan are acknowledged for their contribution with soil samples.
Keywords
- aridity
- biogeography
- climate change
- diversity
- plant diversity
- soil invertebrates