No complexity-stability relationship in natural communities - Cornell University Library

No complexity-stability relationship in natural communities

 

Claire Jacquet, Charlotte Moritz, Lyne Morissette, Pierre Legagneux, François Massol, Phillippe Archambault, Dominique Gravel

(Submitted on 20 Jul 2013)

We performed a stability analysis of 119 quantitative food webs which were compiled using a standard methodology to build Ecopath mass-balance models. Our analysis reveals that classic descriptors of complexity do not affect stability in natural food webs. Food web structure, which is non-random in real communities, reflects another form of complexity that we found influences dramatically the stability of real communities. We conclude that the occurrence of complex communities in nature is possible owing to their trophic structure.

Comments:	Main text: 9 pages, 4 figures. Supplementary Information: 14 pages, 3 figures
Subjects:	Populations and Evolution (q-bio.PE)
Cite as:	arXiv:1307.5364 [q-bio.PE]
	(or arXiv:1307.5364v1 [q-bio.PE] for this version) http://arxiv.org/abs/1307.5364

Submission history

From: Dominique Gravel [view email]
[v1] Sat, 20 Jul 2013 01:51:27 GMT (362kb,D)