The DOI matches its Crossref record; 42 of the 42 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Positive interactions among competitors can produce species‐rich communities
Abstract
Although positive interactions between species are well documented, most ecological theory for investigating multispecies coexistence remains rooted in antagonistic interactions such as competition and predation. Standard resource‐competition models from this theory predict that the number of coexisting species should not exceed the number of factors that limit population growth. Here I show that positive interactions among resource competitors can produce species‐rich model communities supported by a single limiting resource. Simulations show that when resource competitors reduce each others’ per capita mortality rate (e.g. by ameliorating an abiotic stress), stable multispecies coexistence with a single resource may be common, even while the net interspecific interaction remains negative. These results demonstrate that positive interactions may provide an important mechanism for generating species‐rich communities in nature. They also show that focusing on the net interaction between species may conceal important coexistence mechanisms when species simultaneously engage in both antagonistic and positive interactions.
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Cited by
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The multilayer nature of ecological networks
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Competitive and cooperative metabolic interactions in bacterial communities
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Biodiversity: productivity and the temporal stability of productivity: patterns and processes
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Facilitative plant interactions and climate simultaneously drive alpine plant diversity
Cavieres, L. A., Brooker, R. W., Butterfield, B. J., Cook, B. J., Kikvidze, Z., Lortie, C. J., Michalet, R., Pugnaire, F. I., Schöb, C., Xiao, S., et al. (2014) · Ecology Letters · doi:10.1111/ele.12217 · Cited by 357
Metadata
- Authors
- Gross, K.
- Venue
- Ecology Letters
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2008-08-06
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 929-936
- ISSN
- 1461-023X (ISSN-L)
- 1461-0248
- OpenAlex
- W2098988996
- Cited by
- 255
- References
- 42
- FWCI
- 14.52
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
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