A comparative analysis reveals weak relationships between ecological factors and beta diversity of stream insect metacommunities at two spatial levels

Made available in DSpace on 2015-10-21T13:13:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2015-03-01. Added 1 bitstream(s) on 2015-10-22T09:52:00Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 WOS000351458500010.pdf: 1109708 bytes, checksum: 67b46d77c556852b6b2a5bf0a606d9e1 (MD5) Academy of Finland Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) FRGS of Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology EU CONICET Companhia Energetica de Minas Gerais (Peixe Vivo Program) PD ANEEL/CEMIG Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa de Minas Gerais INPA Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) Claude Leon Postdoctoral Fellowship Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) Programa de Apoio a Fixacao de Doutores no Amazonas - FIXAM/AM fellowship Australian Research Council Swiss National Science Foundation Swiss Federal Office for the Environment from Switzerland The hypotheses that beta diversity should increase with decreasing latitude and increase with spatial extent of a region have rarely been tested based on a comparative analysis of multiple datasets, and no such study has focused on stream insects. We first assessed how well variability in beta diversity of stream insect metacommunities is predicted by insect group, latitude, spatial extent, altitudinal range, and dataset properties across multiple drainage basins throughout the world. Second, we assessed the relative roles of environmental and spatial factors in driving variation in assemblage composition within each drainage basin. Our analyses were based on a dataset of 95 stream insect metacommunities from 31 drainage basins distributed around the world. We used dissimilarity-based indices to quantify beta diversity for each metacommunity and, subsequently, regressed beta diversity on insect group, latitude, spatial extent, altitudinal range, and dataset properties (e.g., number of sites and percentage of presences). Within each metacommunity, we used a combination of spatial eigenfunction analyses and partial redundancy analysis to partition variation in assemblage structure into environmental, shared, spatial, and unexplained fractions. We found that dataset properties were more important predictors of beta diversity than ecological and geographical factors across multiple drainage basins. In the within-basin analyses, environmental and spatial variables were generally poor predictors of variation in assemblage composition. Our results revealed deviation from general biodiversity patterns because beta diversity did not show the expected decreasing trend with latitude. Our results also call for reconsideration of just how predictable stream assemblages are along ecological gradients, with implications for environmental assessment and conservation decisions. Our findings may also be applicable to other dynamic systems where predictability is low. Finnish Environment Institute, Natural Environment Centre, Biodiversity, Oulu, Finland Departamento de Ecologia, Universidade Federal de Goiás, Goiânia, GO, Brazil Department of Aquatic Ecology, Eawag: Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Dübendorf, Switzerland Institute of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland School of Biological Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia Biology Department, Faculty of Science, University of Tabuk, Tabuk, Saudi Arabia Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden Departament d'Ecologia, Grup de Recerca Freshwater Ecology and Management (FEM), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain LIESA-CONICET-Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia SJB, Chubut, Argentina Departamento de Biologia Geral, Instituto de Biologia Geral, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada Laboratory of Entomology, School of Biological Sciences, Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador, Quito, Ecuador IRD, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Laboratoire Evolution, Génomes et Spéciation, Gif-sur-Yvette, France School of Biological Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China Laboratorio de Ecología Acuática Colegio de Ciencias Biológicas y Ambientales Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Quito, Ecuador Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Silkeborg, Denmark Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Coordenação de Biodiversidade, Manaus, AM, Brazil 18Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark Departamento de Botânica e Ecologia, Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, Brazil Departamento de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde, Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso do Sul, Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil Section of Conservation Biology, Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland Balaton Limnological Institute, Centre for Ecological Research, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Tihany, Hungary Department of Conservation Ecology and Entomology, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa Instituto de Biociências, UNESP - Universidade Estadual Paulista, Rio Claro, São Paulo, Brazil Institute for Applied Ecology, University of Canberra, Canberra, ACT, Australia Department of Zoology, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. Universidade Estadual Paulista, Instituto de Biociências, Departamento de Ecologia, UNESP - Rio Claro, São Paulo, Brazil Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology: HID98-0323-C05 Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology: REN2001-3438-C07 EU: 226874 CONICET: PIP 5733 PD ANEEL/CEMIG: GT-487 Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa de Minas Gerais: FAPEMIG PPM-00077/13 FAPESP: 2013/50424-1 CNPq: 403949/2013-0 Australian Research Council: FT110100957