Open AccessSpecies‐time‐area and phylogenetic‐time‐area relationships in tropical tree communities
Author(s) -
Swenson Nathan G.,
Mi Xiangcheng,
Kress W. John,
Thompson Jill,
Uriarte María,
Zimmerman Jess K.
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
ecology and evolution
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.17
H-Index - 63
ISSN - 2045-7758
DOI - 10.1002/ece3.526
Subject(s) - biodiversity , ecology , biodiversity hotspot , species diversity , temperate rainforest , phylogenetic diversity , temperate climate , gamma diversity , geography , global biodiversity , spatial ecology , phylogenetic tree , beta diversity , biology , ecosystem , biochemistry , gene
The species‐area relationship ( SAR ) has proven to be one of the few strong generalities in ecology. The temporal analog of the SAR , the species‐time relationship ( STR ), has received considerably less attention. Recent work primarily from the temperate zone has aimed to merge the SAR and the STR into a synthetic and unified species‐time‐area relationship ( STAR ) as originally envisioned by Preston (1960). Here we test this framework using two tropical tree communities and extend it by deriving a phylogenetic‐time‐area relationship ( PTAR ). The work finds some support for Preston's prediction that diversity‐time relationships, both species and phylogenetic, are sensitive to the spatial scale of the sampling. Contrary to the Preston's predictions we find a decoupling of diversity‐area and diversity‐time relationships in both forests as the time period used to quantify the diversity‐area relationship changes. In particular, diversity‐area and diversity‐time relationships are positively correlated using the initial census to quantify the diversity‐area relationship, but weakly or even negatively correlated when using the most recent census. Thus, diversity‐area relationships could forecast the temporal accumulation of biodiversity of the forests, but they failed to “back‐cast” the temporal accumulation of biodiversity suggesting a decoupling of space and time.