title: Species-rich ecosystems are vulnerable to cascading extinctions in an increasingly variable world.
abstract: Global warming leads to increased intensity and frequency of weather extremes. Such increased environmental variability might in turn result in increased variation in the demographic rates of interacting species with potentially important consequences for the dynamics of food webs. Using a theoretical approach, we here explore the response of food webs to a highly variable environment. We investigate how species richness and correlation in the responses of species to environmental fluctuations affect the risk of extinction cascades. We find that the risk of extinction cascades increases with increasing species richness, especially when correlation among species is low. Initial extinctions of primary producer species unleash bottom-up extinction cascades, especially in webs with specialist consumers. In this sense, species-rich ecosystems are less robust to increasing levels of environmental variability than species-poor ones. Our study thus suggests that highly species-rich ecosystems such as coral reefs and tropical rainforests might be particularly vulnerable to increased climate variability.
authors: Linda
authors: L
authors: Kaneryd
authors: Charlotte
authors: C
authors: Borrvall
authors: Sofia
authors: S
authors: Berg
authors: Alva
authors: A
authors: Curtsdotter
authors: Anna
authors: A
authors: Eklöf
authors: Céline
authors: C
authors: Hauzy
authors: Tomas
authors: T
authors: Jonsson
authors: Peter
authors: P
authors: Münger
authors: Malin
authors: M
authors: Setzer
authors: Torbjörn
authors: T
authors: Säterberg
authors: Bo
authors: B
authors: Ebenman