Consequences of biodiversity loss for litter decomposition across biomes

By I. T. Handa, Rien Aerts, F. Berendse, Matty P. Berg, Andreas Bruder, Olaf Butenschoen, É. Chauvet, MO Gessner, J. Jabiol, M. Makkonen and 8 more. Nature, 2014

753 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The decomposition of dead organic matter is a major determinant of carbon and nutrient cycling in ecosystems, and of carbon fluxes between the biosphere and the atmosphere. Decomposition is driven by a vast diversity of organisms that are structured in complex food webs. Identifying the mechanisms underlying the effects of biodiversity on decomposition is critical given the rapid loss of species worldwide and the effects of this loss on human well-being. Yet despite comprehensive syntheses of studies on how biodiversity affects litter decomposition, key questions remain, including when, where and how biodiversity has a role and whether general patterns and mechanisms occur across ecosystems and different functional types of organism. Here, in field experiments across five terrestrial and aquatic locations, ranging from the subarctic to the tropics, we show that reducing the functional diversity of decomposer organisms and plant litter types slowed the cycling of litter carbon and nitrogen. Moreover, we found evidence of nitrogen transfer from the litter of nitrogen-fixing plants to that of rapidly decomposing plants, but not between other plant functional types, highlighting that specific interactions in litter mixtures control carbon and nitrogen cycling during decomposition. The emergence of this general mechanism and the coherence of patterns across contrasting terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems suggest that biodiversity loss has consistent consequences for litter decomposition and the cycling of major elements on broad spatial scales.

Subfields: Ecology, Global and Planetary Change

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/20d7eeef428bb4faae66b8cef442c3ba83570732

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Citations in the corpus

The decomposition of ectomycorrhizal fungal necromass (2016, background): “Using multiple sites across different ecosystems, Handa et al. (2014) demonstrated that decreasing plant litter diversity slows decomposition, and as consequence, C and N cycling were retarded.”
Tree species mixing affects soil microbial functioning indirectly via root and litter traits and soil parameters in European forests (2021, background): “, Hättenschwiler, S., Barantal, S., Schimann, H., & Fromin, N. (2011). Does 711 variability in litter quality determine soil microbial respiration in an Amazonian 712 rainforest? Soil Biology and Biochemistry, 43(5), 1014–1022.”
Białowieża Forest—A Relic of the High Naturalness of European Forests (2019, background): “This web of connections cannot be studied in human-designed intensively managed forests because their functioning has been changed by depleted species composition [12,13], impoverished interactions [14,15] and reduced amounts and diversity of substrates and microhabitats typical to natural forests [”
Plant litter diversity increases microbial abundance, fungal diversity, and carbon and nitrogen cycling in a Mediterranean shrubland (2017, background): “…with previous studies, we observed predominantly non-additive interactions 484 during decomposition, with a majority of synergistic effects that increased with increasing litter 485 species richness (Gartner and Cardon 2004; Lecerf et al., 2007; Handa et al., 2014; Santonja et 486 al., 2015b).”
Improving intercropping: a synthesis of research in agronomy, plant physiology and ecology. (2015, background): “Such studies are enabling us to understand the mechanisms underlying how enhancing the diversity of primary producers (e.g. vascular plants) has consequences for biodiversity and sustainability at a system level (Naeem & Li, 1997; Handa et al., 2014).”
Contrasting mass‐ratio vs. niche complementarity effects on litter C and N loss during decomposition along a regional climatic gradient (2017, methodology): “), representing a wide range of litter traits (Handa et al. 2014), were selected to create 10 litter mixtures (all possible 2- and 3-litter species combinations,”