物种多度和径级尺度对于评价群落系统发育结构的影响: 以尖峰岭热带山地雨林为例

研究不同径级尺度群落系统发育多样性有助于了解不同年龄模式下物种的亲缘关系及其群落系统发育结构; 但是关于物种多度对群落系统发育结构影响的研究较少。以海南尖峰岭热带山地雨林群落为例, 首先在不同径级尺度比较物种多度加权与否分别对4个广泛采用的系统发育指数的影响, 继而利用其中2个经过标准化处理的系统发育多样性指数: 净种间亲缘关系指数(net relatedness index, NRI)和净最近种间亲缘关系指数(nearest taxon index, NTI), 结合群落的生境类型来量度不同局域生境条件下不同径级尺度木本植物系统发育关系。结果发现: (1)未考虑物种多度加权的系统发育平均成对距离(mean pairwise distance, MPD)指数比考虑物种多度加权的MPD指数显著地高估了群落整体系统发育多样性, 且这种现象在小径级尺度(1 cm≤DBH<5 cm)最为明显。因此, 在森林监测样地中对于中、小径级群落系统发育结构研究中建议考虑物种多度信息。(2) 从群落组成整体系统发育结构来看, 尖峰岭热带山地雨林在几乎所有径级尺度和生境下均倾向于系统发育发散, 且随着径级的递增发散程度趋于明显(NRI<0)。(3)从群落组成局部系统发育结构来看, 尖峰岭热带山地雨林在中、小径级倾向于系统发育聚集(NTI>0), 而在大径级(DBH≥15 cm)则倾向于系统发育发散(NTI<0)。总之, 研究群落系统发育结构时应考虑物种多度的影响以及径级尺度效应。     

Dynamic relationships between body size,species richness,abundance, and energy use in a shallow marine epibenthic faunal community

We study the temporal variation in the empirical relationships among body size (S), species richness (R), and abundance (A) in a shallow marine epibenthic faunal community in Coliumo Bay, Chile. We also extend previous analyses by calculating individual energy use (E) and test whether its bivariate and trivariate relationships with S and R are in agreement with expectations derived from the energetic equivalence rule. Carnivorous and scavenger species representing over 95% of sample abundance and biomass were studied. For each individual, body size (g) was measured and E was estimated following published allometric relationships. Data for each sample were tabulated into exponential body size bins, comparing species‐averaged values with individual‐based estimates which allow species to potentially occupy multiple size classes. For individual‐based data, both the number of individuals and species across body size classes are fit by a Weibull function rather than by a power law scaling. Species richness is also a power law of the number of individuals. Energy use shows a piecewise scaling relationship with body size, with energetic equivalence holding true only for size classes above the modal abundance class. Species‐based data showed either weak linear or no significant patterns, likely due to the decrease in the number of data points across body size classes. Hence, for individual‐based size spectra, the SRA relationship seems to be general despite seasonal forcing and strong disturbances in Coliumo Bay. The unimodal abundance distribution results in a piecewise energy scaling relationship, with small individuals showing a positive scaling and large individuals showing energetic equivalence. Hence, strict energetic equivalence should not be expected for unimodal abundance distributions. On the other hand, while species‐based data do not show unimodal SRA relationships, energy use across body size classes did not show significant trends, supporting energetic equivalence.     

Species‐specific ontogenetic diet shifts among Neotropical Crenicichla: using stable isotopes and tissue stoichiometry

Ontogenetic diet shifts were compared among five sympatric pike cichlids Crenicichla in a subtropical South American stream using stable C and N isotopes and tissue stoichiometry (C:N). Within species, stable N isotopes were positively related to body size while C:N showed negative relationships. Stable C isotopes, however, were not related to body size in any species. By modelling the switch to piscivory using gut content‐isotope‐body size relationships, diet shifts were shown to be species‐specific with regard to both rate and degree of piscivory. Compared to other piscivorous lineages, Crenicichla appear to be unusually small‐bodied (based on maximum body size). Because of their diversity, abundance and dynamic size‐structured functional roles, Crenicichla may exert broad and complex predation pressures on the aquatic community.     

Body mass, habitat generality, and avian community composition in forest remnants

Aim Many theories of biodiversity and biogeography assume that species respond equally to variability in habitat area and isolation. This assumption does not allow for differential responses due to interspecific competition or other mechanisms, and therefore does not allow community composition to be predicted. As body size is relevant to area requirements and interspecific dominance, a natural experiment was conducted to quantify the differential responses of avian species abundance to variability in remnant area, isolation and forest cover based on average species body mass. Location Deciduous forest remnants of varying area and isolation throughout the State of Delaware, USA. Methods Forest remnants within stratified area and isolation classes were randomly selected for breeding bird surveys; total forest cover (ha) within 2 km of each survey point was subsequently determined as a covariate. Surveys were conducted within 100–150 m from the edge of each remnant and detected bird species were divided into five classes based on a log₂‐transformation of body mass (very small, small, medium, large and very large). Assuming a negative binomial distribution, the abundance of detected individuals in each mass class was analysed using generalized linear models with remnant area, isolation, local forest cover and two‐way interactions specified as independent variables. The same analyses were conducted for individual species where sample size allowed. Results Very small, small and very large bodied species decreased in abundance with decreasing local forest cover and remnant area and with increasing remnant isolation, while large species increased in abundance. Medium‐sized species decreased in abundance with increasing forest cover, did not respond to remnant isolation and showed a concave, curvilinear response to increasing remnant area. Large and medium‐sized species were the most abundant birds in small, isolated remnants despite occurring in the largest remnants with the more abundant very small and small species, suggesting that communities are not randomly organized. Main conclusions Regardless of presumed habitat associations, large and medium‐sized species are of the appropriate size to be dominant competitors when forest resources are limiting, and thus may be considered ‘generalists’. The smallest species may be excluded entirely from small, isolated remnants even though such remnants meet their ecological needs; the needs of very large species are not met in small remnants. The applicability of biodiversity theories to community composition, species abundance and, by extension, to conservation, can be improved by incorporating differential responses based on body mass into their assumptions.     

Abundance, diversity and body size: patterns from a grassland arthropod community

1. The empirical relationships among body size, species richness and number of individuals may give insight into the factors controlling species diversity and the relative abundances of species. To determine these relationships, we sampled the arthropods of grasslands and savannahs at Cedar Creek, MN using sweep nets (90 525 individuals of 1225 species) and pitfall traps (12 721 individuals of 92 species). Specimens were identified, enumerated and measured to determine body size.
2. Both overall and within abundant taxonomic orders, species richness and numbers of individuals peaked at body sizes intermediate for each group. Evolution could create unimodal diversity patterns by random diversification around an ancestral body size or from size-dependent fitness differences. Local processes such as competition or predation could also create unimodal diversity distributions.
3. The average body size of a species depended significantly on its taxonomic order, but on contemporary trophic role only within the context of taxonomic order.
4. Species richness ( S _i) within size classes was related to the number of individuals ( I _i) as S _i =  I i^0·5. This relationship held across a 100 000-fold range of body sizes. Within size classes, abundance distributions of size classes were all similar power functions. A general rule of resource division, together with similar minimum population sizes, is sufficient to generate the relationship between species richness and number of individuals.
5. Smaller bodied species had slightly shallower abundance distributions and may, in general, persist at lower densities than larger species.
6. Our results suggest there may be fewer undescribed small arthropod species than previously thought and that most undescribed species will be smaller than arthropods.     

Strategies of zooplanktivory shape the dynamics and diversity of littoral plankton communities: a mesocosm approach

Planktivorous fish can exert strong top‐down control on zooplankton communities. By incorporating different feeding strategies, from selective particulate feeding to cruising filter feeding, fish species target distinct prey. In this study, we investigated the effects of two species with different feeding strategies, the three‐spined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus (L.)) and roach (Rutilus rutilus (L.)), on a low‐diversity brackish water zooplankton community using a 16‐day mesocosm experiment. The experiment was conducted on a small‐bodied spring zooplankton community in high‐nutrient conditions, as well as a large‐bodied summer community in low‐nutrient conditions. Effects were highly dependent on the initial zooplankton community structure and hence seasonal variation. In a small‐bodied community with high predation pressure and no dispersal or migration, the selective particulate‐feeding stickleback depleted the zooplankton community and decreased its diversity more radically than the cruising filter‐feeding roach. Cladocerans rather than copepods were efficiently removed by predation, and their removal caused altered patterns in rotifer abundance. In a large‐bodied summer community with initial high taxonomic and functional diversity, predation pressure was lower and resource availability was high for omnivorous crustaceans preying on other zooplankton. In this community, predation maintained diversity, regardless of predator species. During both experimental periods, predation influenced the competitive relationship between the dominant calanoid copepods, and altered species composition and size structure of the zooplankton community. Changes also occurred to an extent at the level of nontarget prey, such as microzooplankton and rotifers, emphasizing the importance of subtle predation effects. We discuss our results in the context of the adaptive foraging mechanism and relate them to the natural littoral community.     

Mass extinctions do not explain skew in interspecific body size distributions

In several higher animal taxa, such as mammals and birds, the distribution of species body sizes is heavily skewed towards small size. Previous studies have suggested that small‐bodied organisms are less prone to extinction than large‐bodied species. If small body size is favourable during mass extinction events, a post mass extinction excess of small‐bodied species may proliferate and maintain skewed body size distributions sometime after. Here, we modelled mass extinctions and found that even unrealistically strong body mass selection has little effect on the skew of interspecific body size distributions. Moreover, selection against large body size may, counter intuitively, skew size distributions towards large body size. In any case, subsequent evolutionary diversification rapidly erases these rather small effects mass extinctions may have on size distributions. Next, we used body masses of extant species and phylogenetic methods to investigate possible changes in body size distributions across the Cretaceous–Paleogene (K‐Pg) mass extinction. Body size distributions of extant clades that originated during the Cretaceous are on average more skewed than their subclades that originated during the Paleogene, but the difference is only minor in mammals, and in birds, it can be explained by a positive relationship between species richness and skewness that is also present in clades that originated after the transition. Hence, we cannot infer from extant species whether the K‐Pg mass extinctions were size‐selective, but they are not the reason why most extant bird and mammal species are small‐bodied.     

Phylogenetic community ecology of soil biodiversity using mitochondrial metagenomics

High‐throughput DNA methods hold great promise for the study of taxonomically intractable mesofauna of the soil. Here, we assess species diversity and community structure in a phylogenetic framework, by sequencing total DNA from bulk specimen samples and assembly of mitochondrial genomes. The combination of mitochondrial metagenomics and DNA barcode sequencing of 1494 specimens in 69 soil samples from three geographic regions in southern Iberia revealed >300 species of soil Coleoptera (beetles) from a broad spectrum of phylogenetic lineages. A set of 214 mitochondrial sequences longer than 3000 bp was generated and used to estimate a well‐supported phylogenetic tree of the order Coleoptera. Shorter sequences, including cox1 barcodes, were placed on this mitogenomic tree. Raw Illumina reads were mapped against all available sequences to test for species present in local samples. This approach simultaneously established the species richness, phylogenetic composition and community turnover at species and phylogenetic levels. We find a strong signature of vertical structuring in soil fauna that shows high local community differentiation between deep soil and superficial horizons at phylogenetic levels. Within the two vertical layers, turnover among regions was primarily at the tip (species) level and was stronger in the deep soil than leaf litter communities, pointing to layer‐mediated drivers determining species diversification, spatial structure and evolutionary assembly of soil communities. This integrated phylogenetic framework opens the application of phylogenetic community ecology to the mesofauna of the soil, among the most diverse and least well‐understood ecosystems, and will propel both theoretical and applied soil science.     

Fishing‐down within populations harms seed dispersal mutualism

Large fish are often the most effective seed dispersers, but they are also the preferred target for fisheries. We recently started to comprehend the detrimental impacts of the extirpation of large frugivorous fish species on natural forest regeneration, but we lack a general understanding of how intraspecific size‐selective harvest affects fish–fruit mutualism. Our literature review demonstrated that large individuals within populations positively affect diverse aspects of seed dispersal, from consuming a higher diversity of seeds to enhancing germination. Furthermore, we filled a research gap by studying how individual size variations within two small frugivorous fish species (<16 cm) affect seed dispersal in flooded savannas. Even within small‐bodied species, large individuals swallow a higher number of intact seeds, but not necessarily a higher proportion. Overall, our results demonstrate the disproportional role of large‐bodied individuals as key seed dispersers in flooded habitats. Consequently, fishing‐down within both large‐ and small‐bodied species can negatively affect seed dispersal and natural regeneration in overfished wetlands.     

Floral resources,body size,and surrounding landscape influence bee community assemblages in oak‐savannah fragments

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Species distribution,ecology, abundance,body size and phylogeny originate interrelated rarity patterns at regional scale

The most pervasive macroecological patterns concern (1) the frequency distribution of range size, (2) the relationship between range size and species abundance and (3) the effect of body size on range size. We investigated these patterns at a regional scale using the tenebrionid beetles of Latium (Central Italy). For this, we calculated geographical range size (no. of 10‐km square cells), ecological tolerance (no. of phytoclimatic units) and abundance (no. of sampled individuals) using a large database containing 3561 georeferenced records for 84 native species. For each species, we also calculated body mass and its ‘phylogenetic diversity’ on the basis of cladistic relationships. Frequency distribution of range size followed a log‐normal distribution as found in many other animal groups. However, a log‐normal distribution accommodated well the frequency distribution of ecological tolerance, a so far unexplored issue. Range size was correlated with abundance and ecological tolerance, thus supporting the hypothesis that a positive correlation between distribution and abundance is a reflection of interspecific differences in ecological specialization. Larger species tended to have larger ranges and broader ecological tolerance. However, contrary to what known in most vertebrates, not only small‐sized, but also many medium‐to‐large‐sized species exhibited great variability in their range size, probably because tenebrionids are not so strictly influenced by body size constraints (e.g. home ranges) as vertebrates. Moreover, in contrast to other animals, tenebrionid body size does not influence species abundances, probably because these detritivorous animals are not strongly regulated by competition. Finally, contrary to the assumption that rare species should be mainly found among lineages that split from basal nodes, rarity of a tenebrionid species was not influenced by the phylogenetic position of its tribe. However, lineages that split from more basal nodes had lower variability in terms of species geographical distribution, ecological tolerance and abundance, which suggests that lineages that split from more basal nodes are not only morphologically conservative but also tend to have an ecological ‘inertia’.     

Foraging guild perturbations and ecological homogenization driven by a despotic native bird species

Anthropogenic activities often cause specialized and fragmentation‐sensitive species to be replaced by competitive commensal or invasive species, resulting in reduced diversity and biotic homogenization. However, biotic homogenization driven by increased dominance of a native species has rarely been investigated. Increased abundance of competitive species can have important consequences for assemblage dynamics including homogenization of foraging strategies and, potentially, ecological services. This study assesses how changes to bird assemblages due to the occurrence of an aggressive honeyeater alter the foraging profiles of avifauna in 400 woodland sites in nine study regions across eastern Australia, and explores the potential implications for ecological services. We compared beta diversity among sites with a high and low abundance of the aggressive Noisy Miner Manorina melanocephala. Shifts in ecological characteristics of bird assemblages of sites with high and low abundance of Noisy Miners, including mean and variation in niche position, bill length and body size, were explored. Sites with a high abundance of Noisy Miners were more taxonomically and ecologically homogeneous and had fewer species than sites with a low abundance of Noisy Miners. The mean niche positions of bird assemblages changed and were increasingly dominated by larger vertebrate feeders, granivores and frugivores as Noisy Miner abundance increased. The mean body size and bill length of the insectivore species present at a site increased with Noisy Miner abundance. This change in the bird community along with reduced diversity in foraging strategies implies a loss of the ecological functions provided by smaller‐bodied species, potentially affecting plant dispersal and regeneration, insect herbivory and ultimately woodland resilience. Our study demonstrates a substantial shift in ecological profile over a broad geographical area as a result of a single native species.     

Soil microbial communities and elk foraging intensity: implications for soil biogeochemical cycling in the sagebrush steppe

Foraging intensity of large herbivores may exert an indirect top‐down ecological force on soil microbial communities via changes in plant litter inputs. We investigated the responses of the soil microbial community to elk (Cervus elaphus) winter range occupancy across a long‐term foraging exclusion experiment in the sagebrush steppe of the North American Rocky Mountains, combining phylogenetic analysis of fungi and bacteria with shotgun metagenomics and extracellular enzyme assays. Winter foraging intensity was associated with reduced bacterial richness and increasingly distinct bacterial communities. Although fungal communities did not respond linearly to foraging intensity, a greater β‐diversity response to winter foraging exclusion was observed. Furthermore, winter foraging exclusion increased soil cellulolytic and hemicellulolytic enzyme potential and higher foraging intensity reduced chitinolytic gene abundance. Thus, future changes in winter range occupancy may shape biogeochemical processes via shifts in microbial communities and subsequent changes to their physiological capacities to cycle soil C and N.     

Do body size and diet breadth affect partitioning of species diversity? A test with forest Lepidoptera

Two of the major themes resulting from recent macroecological research are the central roles that body size and niche breadth may play as determinants of species geographical distribution. Unanswered questions, however, linger regarding how similarities in body size or niche breadth affect the allocation of α‐ and β‐diversity across spatial scales. Using data on moth diversity in the eastern deciduous forest of North America, we tested the predictions that smaller‐bodied and diet‐restricted species would have lower levels of α‐diversity within forest stands and greater β‐diversity at higher sampling scales compared to larger or more generalist species. Moths were sampled using a nested sampling design consisting of three hierarchical levels: 20 forest stands, 5 sites and 3 ecoregions. Body size for 492 species was estimated as mean forewing length, and diet breadth was assessed from the published literature. Moth species were then classified according to body size (small or large) or diet breadth (generalist or restricted), and partitioning was conducted on each group. Diversity partitions for large‐ and small‐bodied species yielded similar patterns. When observed diversity components differed from those derived from our null model, a consistent pattern was observed: α‐diversity was greater than expected, β‐diversity among forest stands was less than expected, and β‐diversity among sites and ecoregions was higher than expected. In contrast, diet‐restricted moths contributed significantly less to stand‐level α‐diversity than generalist feeders. Furthermore, specialists contributed to a greater proportion of β‐diversity across scales compared to generalist moths. Because absolute measures of β‐diversity among stands were greater for generalists than for restricted feeders, we suggest that regional β‐diversity of forest moths may be influenced by several possible factors: intraspecific aggregation of diet‐restricted species, local fluctuations in population size of eruptive generalists and small geographical distributions of generalist moths than predicted by the geographical extent of putative host plants     

Modelling the responses of Australian subtropical rainforest birds to changes in environmental conditions along elevational gradients

Montane birds face significant threats from a warming climate, so determining the environmental factors that most strongly influence the composition of such assemblages is of critical conservation importance. Changes in temperature and other environmental conditions along elevational gradients are known to influence the species richness and abundance of bird assemblages occupying mountains. However, the role of species‐specific traits in mediating the responses of bird species to changing conditions remains poorly understood. We aimed to determine whether different bird species responded differently to changing environmental conditions in a relatively understudied biodiversity hotspot in subtropical rainforest on the east coast of Australia. We examined patterns in avian species richness and abundance along two rainforest elevational gradients using monthly point counts between September 2015 and October 2016. Environmental data on temperature, wetness, canopy cover and canopy height were collected simultaneously, and trait information on body size and feeding guild membership for each bird species was obtained from the Handbook of Australian, New Zealand and Antarctic Birds. We used a generalized linear mixed modelling (GLMM) framework to determine the drivers of species richness and abundance and to quantify species’ trait–environment interactions. GLMMs indicated that temperature alone was significantly positively correlated with species richness and abundance. Species richness declined with increasing elevation. When modelling abundance, we found that feeding guild membership did not significantly affect species’ responses to environmental conditions. In contrast, the predicted abundance of a species was found to depend on its body size, due to significant positive interactions between this trait, temperature and canopy cover. Our findings indicate that large‐bodied birds are likely to increase in abundance more rapidly than small‐bodied birds with continued climatic warming. These results underline the importance of temperature as a driving factor of avian community assembly along environmental gradients.     

Hormones and body size evolution in papionin primates

This study examines the evolution of size differences among papionin primates by measuring hormones that regulate size growth during ontogeny and influence ultimate adult size (insulin‐like growth factor‐I (IGF‐I), insulin‐like growth factor binding protein‐3 (IGFBP‐3), growth hormone binding protein (GHBP), dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS), testosterone, estradiol). The analyses assess longstanding ideas about circulating hormone levels and body size. Importantly, because the consensus papionin molecular phylogeny implies at least two episodes of size increase, this study offers opportunities to determine whether or not similar hormone profiles regulate this apparent evolutionary convergence (i.e., do larger‐bodied papionins have higher levels of growth‐related hormones than smaller‐bodied papionins?). Five hundred and sixty serum samples (from 161 individuals) from 11 papionin species were analyzed using a two‐level approach to address this issue. One used mixed longitudinal samples from two papionin species to test whether, during growth, large‐ and small‐bodied species have higher and lower hormone levels, respectively. The second compared multiple papionin species to assess whether or not hormone levels covary with size in adult animals. Result show that size and hormone levels do not covary consistently across papionins, either during growth or in adulthood. Specifically, some smaller‐bodied papionin species have higher absolute hormone levels than larger‐bodied species. Differences in some hormone levels appear to track phylogeny more closely than body size. In contrast to studies based on single species, we demonstrate that, while the hormones analyzed affect growth, absolute circulating hormone levels either during growth or adulthood may be decoupled from interspecific differences in body size. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2007. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Inter‐assemblage facilitation: the functional diversity of cavity‐producing beetles drives the size diversity of cavity‐nesting bees

Inter‐specific interactions are important drivers and maintainers of biodiversity. Compared to trophic and competitive interactions, the role of non‐trophic facilitation among species has received less attention. Cavity‐nesting bees nest in old beetle borings in dead wood, with restricted diameters corresponding to the body size of the bee species. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that the functional diversity of cavity‐producing wood boring beetles ‐ in terms of cavity diameters ‐ drives the size diversity of cavity‐nesting bees. The invertebrate communities were sampled in 30 sites, located in forested landscapes along an elevational gradient. We regressed the species richness and abundance of cavity nesting bees against the species richness and abundance of wood boring beetles, non‐wood boring beetles and elevation. The proportion of cavity nesting bees in bee species assemblage was regressed against the species richness and abundance of wood boring beetles. We also tested the relationships between the size diversity of cavity nesting bees and wood boring beetles. The species richness and abundance of cavity nesting bees increased with the species richness and abundance of wood boring beetles. No such relationship was found for non‐wood boring beetles. The abundance of wood boring beetles was also related to an increased proportion of cavity nesting bee individuals. Moreover, the size diversity of cavity‐nesting bees increased with the functional diversity of wood boring beetles. Specifically, the mean and dispersion of bee body sizes increased with the functional dispersion of large wood boring beetles. The positive relationships between cavity producing bees and cavity nesting bees suggest that non‐trophic facilitative interactions between species assemblages play important roles in organizing bee species assemblages. Considering a community‐wide approach may therefore be required if we are to successfully understand and conserve wild bee species assemblages in forested landscapes.     

The effects of predation by juvenile fish on the meiobenthic community structure in a natural pond

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Top–down limits on prey populations may be more severe in larger prey species,despite having fewer predators

Variation in the vulnerability of herbivore prey to predation is linked to body size, yet whether this relationship is size‐nested or size‐partitioned remains debated. If size‐partitioned, predators would be focused on prey within their preferred prey size range. If size‐nested, smaller prey species should become increasingly more vulnerable because increasingly more predators are capable of catching them. Yet, whether either of these strategies manifests in top–down prey population limitation would depend both on the number of potential predator species as well as the total mortality imposed. Here we use a rare ecosystem scale ‘natural experiment’ comparing prey population dynamics between a period of intense predator persecution and hence low predator densities and a period of active predator protection and population recovery. We use three decades of data on herbivore abundance and distribution to test the role of predation as a mechanism of population limitation among prey species that vary widely in body size. Notably, we test this within one of the few remaining systems where a near‐full suite of megaherbivores occur in high density and are thus able to include a thirtyfold range in herbivore body size gradient. We test whether top–down limitation on prey species of particular body size leads to compositional shifts in the mammalian herbivore community. Our results support both size‐nested and size‐partitioning predation but suggest that the relative top–down limiting impact on prey populations may be more severe for intermediate sized species, despite having fewer predators than small species. In addition we show that the gradual recovery of predator populations shifted the herbivore community assemblage towards large‐bodied species and has led to a community that is strongly dominated by large herbivore biomass.     

The global impact of Wolbachia on mitochondrial diversity and evolution

The spread of maternally inherited microorganisms, such as Wolbachia bacteria, can induce indirect selective sweeps on host mitochondria, to which they are linked within the cytoplasm. The resulting reduction in effective population size might lead to smaller mitochondrial diversity and reduced efficiency of natural selection. While documented in several host species, it is currently unclear if such a scenario is common enough to globally impact the diversity and evolution of mitochondria in Wolbachia‐infected lineages. Here, we address this question using a mapping of Wolbachia acquisition/extinction events on a large mitochondrial DNA tree, including over 1000 species. Our analyses indicate that on a large phylogenetic scale, other sources of variation, such as mutation rates, tend to hide the effects of Wolbachia. However, paired comparisons between closely related infected and uninfected taxa reveal that Wolbachia is associated with a twofold reduction in silent mitochondrial polymorphism, and a 13% increase in nonsynonymous substitution rates. These findings validate the conjecture that the widespread distribution of Wolbachia infections throughout arthropods impacts the effective population size of mitochondria. These effects might in part explain the disconnection between genetic diversity and demographic population size in mitochondria, and also fuel red‐queen‐like cytonuclear co‐evolution through the fixation of deleterious mitochondrial alleles.