title: Nonrandom processes maintain diversity in tropical forests.
abstract: An ecological community's species diversity tends to erode through time as a result of stochastic extinction, competitive exclusion, and unstable host-enemy dynamics. This erosion of diversity can be prevented over the short term if recruits are highly diverse as a result of preferential recruitment of rare species or, alternatively, if rare species survive preferentially, which increases diversity as the ages of the individuals increase. Here, we present census data from seven New and Old World tropical forest dynamics plots that all show the latter pattern. Within local areas, the trees that survived were as a group more diverse than those that were recruited or those that died. The larger (and therefore on average older) survivors were more diverse within local areas than the smaller survivors. When species were rare in a local area, they had a higher survival rate than when they were common, resulting in enrichment for rare species and increasing diversity with age and size class in these complex ecosystems.
authors.affiliation: Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0116, USA. cwills@ucsd.edu
authors.forename: Christopher
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Wills
authors.forename: Kyle E
authors.initials: KE
authors.lastname: Harms
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Condit
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: King
authors.forename: Jill
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Thompson
authors.forename: Fangliang
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: He
authors.forename: Helene C
authors.initials: HC
authors.lastname: Muller-Landau
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Ashton
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Losos
authors.forename: Liza
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Comita
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hubbell
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lafrankie
authors.forename: Sarayudh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bunyavejchewin
authors.forename: H S
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Dattaraja
authors.forename: Stuart
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Davies
authors.forename: Shameema
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Esufali
authors.forename: Robin
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Foster
authors.forename: Nimal
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gunatilleke
authors.forename: Savitri
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gunatilleke
authors.forename: Pamela
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Hall
authors.forename: Akira
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Itoh
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: John
authors.forename: Somboon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kiratiprayoon
authors.forename: Suzanne Loo
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: de Lao
authors.forename: Marie
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Massa
authors.forename: Cheryl
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Nath
authors.forename: Md Nur Supardi
authors.initials: MN
authors.lastname: Noor
authors.forename: Abdul Rahman
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Kassim
authors.forename: Raman
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sukumar
authors.forename: Hebbalalu Satyanarayana
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Suresh
authors.forename: I-Fang
authors.initials: IF
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: Sylvester
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.forename: Takuo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Yamakura
authors.forename: Jess
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zimmerman
mesh_terms: D044822:Biodiversity; D017753:Ecosystem; D011156:Population Density; D011157:Population Dynamics; D014197:Trees / Q000254:growth & development; D014329:Tropical Climate