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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
agricultural and biological sciences
A framework for evaluating the influence of climate, dispersal limitation, and biotic interactions using fossil pollen associations across the late Quaternary
Ecography, Volume 37, No. 11, Year 2014
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Description
Environmental conditions, dispersal lags, and interactions among species are major factors structuring communities through time and across space. Ecologists have emphasized the importance of biotic interactions in determining local patterns of species association. In contrast, abiotic limits, dispersal limitation, and historical factors have commonly been invoked to explain community structure patterns at larger spatiotemporal scales, such as the appearance of late Pleistocene no-analog communities or latitudinal gradients of species richness in both modern and fossil assemblages. Quantifying the relative influence of these processes on species co-occurrence patterns is not straightforward. We provide a framework for assessing causes of species associations by combining a null-model analysis of co-occurrence with additional analyses of climatic differences and spatial pattern for pairs of pollen taxa that are significantly associated across geographic space. We tested this framework with data on associations among 106 fossil pollen taxa and paleoclimate simulations from eastern North America across the late Quaternary. The number and proportion of significantly associated taxon pairs increased over time, but only 449 of 56 194 taxon pairs were significantly different from random. Within this significant subset of pollen taxa, biotic interactions were rarely the exclusive cause of associations. Instead, climatic or spatial differences among sites were most frequently associated with significant patterns of taxon association. Most taxon pairs that exhibited co-occurrence patterns indicative of biotic interactions at one time did not exhibit significant associations at other times. Evidence for environmental filtering and dispersal limitation was weakest for aggregated pairs between 16 and 11 kyr BP, suggesting enhanced importance of positive species interactions during this interval. The framework can thus be used to identify species associations that may reflect biotic interactions because these associations are not tied to environmental or spatial differences. Furthermore, temporally repeated analyses of spatial associations can reveal whether such associations persist through time. © 2014 The Authors.
Authors & Co-Authors
Blois, Jessica L.
United States, Merced
Uc Merced
Gotelli, Nicholas J.
United States, Burlington
The University of Vermont
Behrensmeyer, Anna Kay
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Faith, J. Tyler
Australia, Brisbane
The University of Queensland
Lyons, S. Kathleen
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Williams, John Warren
United States, Madison
University of Wisconsin-madison
Amatangelo, Kathryn L.
United States, Brockport
Suny Brockport
Bercovici, Antoine D.
Sweden, Lund
Lunds Universitet
Du, Andrew
United States, Washington, D.c.
The George Washington University
Eronen, Jussi Tuomas
Finland, Helsinki
Helsingin Yliopisto
Graves, Gary R.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Denmark, Copenhagen
Københavns Universitet
Jud, Nathan A.
United States, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
Labandeira, Conrad C.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
United States, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
Looy, Cindy V.
United States, Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
McGill, Brian J.
United States, Orono
University of Maine
Patterson, David B.
United States, Washington, D.c.
The George Washington University
Potts, Richard
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Riddle, Brett R.
United States, Las Vegas
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Terry, Rebecca C.
United States, Corvallis
Oregon State University
Tóth, Anikó B.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Villaseñor, Amelia
United States, Washington, D.c.
The George Washington University
Wing, Scott L.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Statistics
Citations: 71
Authors: 22
Affiliations: 15
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1111/ecog.00779
ISSN:
09067590
Research Areas
Environmental