How Should Beta-Diversity Inform Biodiversity Conservation?
Open accessAbstract
To design robust protected area networks, accurately measure species losses, or understand the processes that maintain species diversity, conservation science must consider the organization of biodiversity in space. Central is beta-diversity--the component of regional diversity that accumulates from compositional differences between local species assemblages. We review how beta-diversity is impacted by human activities, including farming, selective logging, urbanization, species invasions, overhunting, and climate change. Beta-diversity increases, decreases, or remains unchanged by these impacts, depending on the balance of processes that cause species composition to become more different (biotic heterogenization) or more similar (biotic homogenization) between sites. While maintaining high beta-diversity is not always a desirable conservation outcome, understanding beta-diversity is essential for protecting regional diversity and can directly assist conservation planning.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Previous research on co-benefits of forest restoration has focused on where to restore.
“Previous research on the co-benefits of forest restoration has focused on 'where to restore' (29,49).”
From The biodiversity and ecosystem service contributions and trade-offs of forest restoration approaches (2022) · cites this paper as [49]
The Protected area selection section discusses where to locate reserves, and the References list includes a study of carbon and biodiversity co-benefits from forest regeneration. Neither passage says that previous research on forest-restoration co-benefits focused on where to restore. Searches for restoration site selection and co-benefits found no passage making that point; the indexed passages provide section labels but no page numbers. (LLM, conf=0.72)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Cites
Has the Earth’s sixth mass extinction already arrived?
Barnosky, A. D., Matzke, N., Tomiya, S., Wogan, G. O. U., Swartz, B., Quental, T. B., Marshall, C., McGuire, J. L., Lindsey, E. L., Maguire, K. C., et al. (2011) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature09678 · Cited by 4,400 · see citing works
Defaunation in the Anthropocene
Dirzo, R., Young, H. S., Galetti, M., Ceballos, G., Isaac, N. J. B., & Collen, B. (2014) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1251817 · Cited by 4,305 · see citing works
The biodiversity of species and their rates of extinction, distribution, and protection
Pimm, S. L., Jenkins, C. N., Abell, R., Brooks, T. M., Gittleman, J. L., Joppa, L. N., Raven, P. H., Roberts, C. M., & Sexton, J. O. (2014) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1246752 · Cited by 3,542 · see citing works
Accelerating extinction risk from climate change
Urban, M. C. (2015) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.aaa4984 · Cited by 2,436 · see citing works
Higher levels of multiple ecosystem services are found in forests with more tree species
Gamfeldt, L., Snäll, T., Bagchi, R., Jonsson, M., Gustafsson, L., Kjellander, P., Ruiz-Jaen, M. C., Fröberg, M., Stendahl, J., Philipson, C. D., et al. (2013) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/ncomms2328 · Cited by 1,477 · see citing works
Global meta-analysis reveals no net change in local-scale plant biodiversity over time
Vellend, M., Baeten, L., Myers-Smith, I. H., Elmendorf, S. C., Beauséjour, R., Brown, C. D., De Frenne, P., Verheyen, K., & Wipf, S. (2013) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.1312779110 · Cited by 628 · see citing works
Edwards, D. P., Larsen, T. H., Docherty, T. D. S., Ansell, F. A., Hsu, W. W., Derhé, M. A., Hamer, K. C., & Wilcove, D. S. (2011) · Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences · doi:10.1098/rspb.2010.1062 · Cited by 360 · see citing works
Self-citation
Flagged first, then by citations
Research works printed but not linked: 25
- Vila, M. et al. (2011) Ecological impacts of invasive alien plants: a meta- analysis of their effects on species, communities and ecosystems. Ecol 640 Letters 14, 702-708
- McClain, C.R. et al. (2012) Dispersal, environmental niches and oceanic-scale 650 turnover in deep-sea bivalves. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 279, 1993-2002
- Gardner, T.A. et al. (2013) A social and ecological assessment of tropical land uses at multiple scales: the Sustainable Amazon Network. Philosophical 660 Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 368, 20120166- 20120166
- Anderson, M.J. et al. (2011) Navigating the multiple meanings of β diversity: a roadmap for the practicing ecologist. Ecol Letters 14, 19-28 14
- Buckley, L.B. and Jetz, W. (2008) Linking global turnover of species and environments. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United 670 States of America 105, 17836-17841
- Karp, D.S. et al. (2012) Intensive agriculture erodes β-diversity at large scales. Ecol Letters 15, 963-970
- Clough, Y. et al. (2007) Alpha and beta diversity of arthropods and plants in organically and conventionally managed wheat fields. Journal of Applied Ecology 44, 804-812 695
- Vellend, M. et al. (2007) Homogenization of forest plant communities and weakening of species-environment relationships via agricultural land use. Journal of Ecology 95, 565-573
- Clough, Y. et al. (2011) Combining high biodiversity with high yields in tropical agroforests. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 108, 8311-8316
- Tucker, C.M. et al. (2015) Differentiating between niche and neutral assembly in metacommunities using null models of β-diversity. Oikos DOI: 740 10.1111/oik.02803 · DOI
- McCune, J.L. and Vellend, M. (2013) Gains in native species promote biotic 745 homogenization over four decades in a human-dominated landscape. Journal of Ecology 101, 1542-1551 46
- Pomara, L.Y. et al. (2014) Avian species composition across the Amazon River: the roles of dispersal limitation and environmental heterogeneity. Journal of BIogeography 41, 784-796 750 47
- Hendrickx, F. et al. (2007) How landscape structure, land-use intensity and habitat diversity affect components of total arthropod diversity in agricultural landscapes. Journal of Applied Ecology 44, 340-351
- Tylianakis, J.M. et al. (2006) Spatial scale of observation affects alpha, beta 765 and gamma diversity of cavity-nesting bees and wasps across a tropical land-use gradient. Journal of BIogeography 33, 1295-1304
- Rodrigues, J.L.M. et al. (2013) Conversion of the Amazon rainforest to agriculture results in biotic homogenization of soil bacterial communities. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110, 988-993 770
- Aronson, M.F.J. et al. (2014) A global analysis of the impacts of urbanization on bird and plant diversity reveals key anthropogenic drivers. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 281, 20133330-20133330
- Luck, G.W. and Smallbone, L.T. (2010) The impact of urbanization on taxonomic and functional similarity among bird communities. Journal of 785 BIogeography 38, 894-906
- Knop, E. (2015) Biotic homogenization of three insect groups due to urbanization. Global Change Biology DOI: 10.1111/gcb.13091 · DOI
- Thomas, C.D. and Palmer, G. (2015) Non-native plants add to the British 810 flora without negative consequences for native diversity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112, 4387-4392
- Stohlgren, T.J. and Rejmanek, M. (2014) No universal scale-dependent impacts of invasive species on native plant species richness. Biology Letters 10, 20130939-20130939 815
- Duncan, R.P. et al. (2013) Magnitude and variation of prehistoric bird 820 extinctions in the Pacific. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110, 6436-6441
- Pearson, R.G. (2006) Climate change and the migration capacity of species. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 21, 111-113 840
- Tingley, M.W. et al. (2009) Birds track their Grinnellian niche through a century of climate change. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciencesa 106, 19637-19643 865
- Crist, T.O. and Veech, J.A. (2006) Additive partitioning of rarefaction curves and species-area relationships: unifying α-, β-and γ-diversity with sample size and habitat area. Ecol Letters 9, 923-932 875
- Rosindell, J. and Cornell, S.J. (2007) Species-area relationships from a spatially explicit neutral model in an infinite landscape. Ecol Letters 10, 586- 595
Cited by
Sorted by citations
The biodiversity and ecosystem service contributions and trade-offs of forest restoration approaches
Hua, F., Bruijnzeel, L. A., Meli, P., Martin, P. A., Zhang, J., Nakagawa, S., Miao, X., Wang, W., McEvoy, C., Peña-Arancibia, J. L., et al. (2022) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.abl4649 · Cited by 831 · see citing works
Self-citationNewbold, T., Hudson, L. N., Contu, S., Hill, S. L. L., Beck, J., Liu, Y., Meyer, C., Phillips, H. R. P., Scharlemann, J. P. W., & Purvis, A. (2018) · PLOS Biology · doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.2006841 · Cited by 287 · see citing works
Hill, M. J., Heino, J., Thornhill, I., Ryves, D. B., & Wood, P. J. (2017) · Oikos · doi:10.1111/oik.04266 · Cited by 138 · see citing works
Sun, J., Doeser, A., Cao, Y., Lv, X., Li, W., & Liu, F. (2022) · Aquatic Botany · doi:10.1016/j.aquabot.2021.103468 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
- Authors
- Socolar, J. B., Gilroy, J. J., Kunin, W. E., & Edwards, D. P.
- Affiliations
- Princeton University (US)
- University of East Anglia (GB)
- University of Leeds (GB)
- University of Sheffield (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Socolar, Jacob B.
- Edwards, David P.
- Venue
- Trends in Ecology & Evolution
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2016-01
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 67-80
- ISSN
- 0169-5347 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2216692843
- Cited by
- 1,414
- References
- 7
- Citations by year
- 2026: 198 · 2025: 172 · 2024: 168 · 2023: 141 · 2022: 144 · 2021: 143 · 2020: 140 · 2019: 132 · 2018: 93 · 2017: 65 · 2016: 17
- FWCI
- 4.40
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk
- Locations
- Trends in Ecology & Evolution (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- White Rose Research Online (University of Leeds, The University of Sheffield, University of York) (acceptedVersion)
- UEA Digital Repository (University of East Anglia) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation
- Norges Forskningsråd
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Land Use and Ecosystem Services
- Keywords
- beta diversity, biodiversity conservation, protected area network, species composition, biotic homogenization, human impact on biodiversity, selective logging, urbanization, biological invasions, overhunting, climate change, regional variation, conservation planning
- MeSH terms
- Agriculture, Conservation of Natural Resources, Urbanization, Forestry, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Introduced Species, Spatial Analysis
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
