One of ecology's grand challenges is developing general rules to explain and predict highly
complex systems. Understanding and predicting ecological processes from species' traits …

Aquatic ecologists face challenges in identifying the general rules of the functioning of
ecosystems. A common framework, including freshwater, marine, benthic, and pelagic …

Plants influence the atmosphere through fluxes of carbon, water and energy, and can
intensify drought through land–atmosphere feedback effects,–. The diversity of plant …

Microorganisms drive much of the Earth's nitrogen (N) cycle, but we still lack a global
overview of the abundance and composition of the microorganisms carrying out soil N …

Understanding the relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning has been a
core ecological research topic over the past decades. Although a key hypothesis is that the …

Trait‐based approaches are increasingly being used to test mechanisms underlying species
assemblages and biotic interactions across a wide range of organisms including terrestrial …

Functional trait research has led to greater understanding of the impacts of biodiversity in
ecosystems. Yet, functional trait approaches have not been widely applied to …

The goal of conservation and restoration activities is to maintain biological diversity and the
ecosystem services that this diversity provides. These activities traditionally focus on the …

The relationship between biodiversity and the rapidly expanding research and policy field of
ecosystem services is confused and is damaging efforts to create coherent policy. Using the …

People depend on benefits provided by ecological systems. Understanding how these
ecosystem services–and the ecosystem properties underpinning them–respond to drivers of …