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Additive partitioning of diversity including species differences: a comment on Hardy & Senterre (2007)
Author(s) -
Villéger Sébastien,
Mouillot David
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
journal of ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.452
H-Index - 181
eISSN - 1365-2745
pISSN - 0022-0477
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2007.01351.x
Subject(s) - biodiversity , biological dispersal , phylogenetic diversity , global biodiversity , ecology , species diversity , entropy (arrow of time) , niche , functional diversity , decomposition , biology , phylogenetic tree , population , biochemistry , physics , demography , quantum mechanics , sociology , gene
Summary1 The distribution of biodiversity at multiple spatial scales has been traditionally investigated through the additive partitioning of γ‐biodiversity (regional) into α‐(within‐site) and β‐(among‐site) components. 2 However, this decomposition is almost exclusively applied using species turnover among communities while two communities with no species in common can be very similar because they share some ‘biological’ similarity. 3 To overcome this limitation, Hardy & Senterre (2007) ( J. Ecol. , 95 , 493–506) presented a new statistical framework partitioning the phylogenetic diversity into α‐ and β‐components using the Rao's quadratic entropy. 4 We show that their decomposition is correct only when sites have the same total abundance, otherwise it may lead to negative β‐diversity values. As an alternative, we provided a general decomposition of the quadratic entropy into α‐, β‐ and γ‐diversities. 5 Synthesis. We suggest that the ‘biological’ turnover quantified by the β‐component of the regional quadratic entropy may help, at least, to disentangle dispersal vs. niche influences on biodiversity patterns.