Publication Date:
2020-12-04
Description:
Dispersal and foodweb dynamics have long been studied in separate
models. However, over the past decades, it has become abundantly clear
that there are intricate interactions between local dynamics and spatial
patterns. Trophic meta-communities, i.e. meta-foodwebs, are very complex
systems that exhibit complex and often counterintuitive dynamics. Over
the past decade, a broad range of modelling approaches have been used
to study these systems. In this paper, we review these approaches and the
insights that they have revealed. We focus particularly on recent papers
that study trophic interactions in spatially extensive settings and highlight
the common themes that emerged in different models. There is overwhelming evidence that dispersal (and particularly intermediate levels of dispersal)
benefits the maintenance of biodiversity in several different ways. Moreover,
some insights have been gained into the effect of different habitat topologies,
but these results also show that the exact relationships are much more
complex than previously thought, highlighting the need for further research
in this area.
This article is part of the theme issue ‘Integrative research perspectives
on marine conservation’.
Repository Name:
EPIC Alfred Wegener Institut
Type:
Article
,
isiRev
Format:
application/pdf
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