Baker TR, Pennington RT, Magallon S, Gloor E, Laurance WF, Alexiades M, Alvarez E, Araujo A, Arets EJMM, Aymard G, de Oliveira AA, Amaral I, Arroyo L, Bonal D, Brienen RJW, Chave J, Dexter KG, Di Fiore A, Eler E, Feldpausch TR, Ferreira L, Lopez-Gonzalez G, van der Heijden G, Higuchi N, Honorio E, Huamantupa I, Killeen TJ, Laurance S, Leaño C, Lewis SL, Malhi Y, Marimon BS, Marimon Junior BH, Monteagudo Mendoza A, Neill D, Peñuela-Mora MC, Pitman N, Prieto A, Quesada CA, Ramírez F, Ramírez Angulo H, Rudas A, Ruschel AR, Salomão RP, de Andrade AS, Silva JNM, Silveira M, Simon MF, Spironello W, ter Steege H, Terborgh J, Toledo M, Torres-Lezama A, Vasquez R, Vieira ICG, Vilanova E, Vos VA, Phillips OL. Fast demographic traits promote high diversification rates of Amazonian trees.
Ecol Lett 2014;
17:527-36. [PMID:
24589190 PMCID:
PMC4285998 DOI:
10.1111/ele.12252]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 37] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/18/2013] [Revised: 10/17/2013] [Accepted: 12/30/2013] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
The Amazon rain forest sustains the world's highest tree diversity, but it remains unclear why some clades of trees are hyperdiverse, whereas others are not. Using dated phylogenies, estimates of current species richness and trait and demographic data from a large network of forest plots, we show that fast demographic traits – short turnover times – are associated with high diversification rates across 51 clades of canopy trees. This relationship is robust to assuming that diversification rates are either constant or decline over time, and occurs in a wide range of Neotropical tree lineages. This finding reveals the crucial role of intrinsic, ecological variation among clades for understanding the origin of the remarkable diversity of Amazonian trees and forests.
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