Trait similarity in reef fish faunas across the world’s oceans

Matthew McLean, Rick D. Stuart-Smith, Sébastien Villéger, Arnaud Auber, Graham J. Edgar, M. Aaron MacNeil, Nicolas Loiseau, Fabien Leprieur, David Mouillot

Résultat de recherche: Articleexamen par les pairs

62 Citations (Scopus)

Résumé

Species’ traits, rather than taxonomic identities, determine community assembly and ecosystem functioning, yet biogeographic patterns have been far less studied for traits. While both environmental conditions and evolutionary history shape trait biogeography, their relative contributions are largely unknown for most organisms. Here, we explore the global biogeography of reef fish traits for 2,786 species from 89 ecoregions spanning eight marine realms with contrasting environmental conditions and evolutionary histories. Across realms, we found a common structure in the distribution of species traits despite a 10-fold gradient in species richness, with a defined “backbone” of 21 trait combinations shared by all realms globally, both temperate and tropical. Across ecoregions, assemblages under similar environmental conditions had similar trait compositions despite hosting drastically different species pools from separate evolutionary lineages. Thus, despite being separated by thousands of kilometers and millions of years of evolution, similar environments host similar trait compositions in reef fish assemblages worldwide. Our findings suggest that similar trait-based management strategies can be applied among regions with distinct species pools, potentially improving conservation outcomes across diverse jurisdictions.

Langue d'origineEnglish
Numéro d'articlee2012318118
JournalProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Volume118
Numéro de publication12
DOI
Statut de publicationPublished - mars 23 2021

Note bibliographique

Funding Information:
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. We thank all RLS divers worldwide whose data collection efforts made this study possible. This research used the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy-enabled Integrated Marine Observing System infrastructure for database support and storage. This research was funded through the 2017–2018 Belmont Forum and BiodivERsA REEF-FUTURES project under the BiodivScen ERA-Net COFUND program along with the French National Research Agency, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (Grant No. RGPBB/525590), the Canada Research Chairs Program, and the Ocean Frontier Institute.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.

ASJC Scopus Subject Areas

  • General

PubMed: MeSH publication types

  • Journal Article
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

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