title: Commonness and rarity in the marine biosphere.
abstract: Explaining patterns of commonness and rarity is fundamental for understanding and managing biodiversity. Consequently, a key test of biodiversity theory has been how well ecological models reproduce empirical distributions of species abundances. However, ecological models with very different assumptions can predict similar species abundance distributions, whereas models with similar assumptions may generate very different predictions. This complicates inferring processes driving community structure from model fits to data. Here, we use an approximation that captures common features of "neutral" biodiversity models--which assume ecological equivalence of species--to test whether neutrality is consistent with patterns of commonness and rarity in the marine biosphere. We do this by analyzing 1,185 species abundance distributions from 14 marine ecosystems ranging from intertidal habitats to abyssal depths, and from the tropics to polar regions. Neutrality performs substantially worse than a classical nonneutral alternative: empirical data consistently show greater heterogeneity of species abundances than expected under neutrality. Poor performance of neutral theory is driven by its consistent inability to capture the dominance of the communities' most-abundant species. Previous tests showing poor performance of a neutral model for a particular system often have been followed by controversy about whether an alternative formulation of neutral theory could explain the data after all. However, our approach focuses on common features of neutral models, revealing discrepancies with a broad range of empirical abundance distributions. These findings highlight the need for biodiversity theory in which ecological differences among species, such as niche differences and demographic trade-offs, play a central role.
authors.affiliation: School of Marine and Tropical Biology, and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD 4811, Australia; knowlton@si.edu Sean.connolly@jcu.edu.au.
authors.forename: Sean R
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Connolly
authors.affiliation: Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville, QLD 4810, Australia;
authors.forename: M Aaron
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: MacNeil
authors.affiliation: Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville, QLD 4810, Australia;
authors.forename: M Julian
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Caley
authors.affiliation: National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20013; knowlton@si.edu Sean.connolly@jcu.edu.au.
authors.forename: Nancy
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Knowlton
authors.affiliation: School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Western Australia, Perth, WA 6009, Australia;
authors.forename: Ed
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Cripps
authors.affiliation: School of Marine and Tropical Biology, and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD 4811, Australia;
authors.forename: Mizue
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hisano
authors.affiliation: School of Marine and Tropical Biology, and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD 4811, Australia;
authors.forename: Loïc M
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Thibaut
authors.affiliation: Department of Marine Science, University of Calcutta, Calcutta 700 019, India;
authors.forename: Bhaskar D
authors.initials: BD
authors.lastname: Bhattacharya
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia, University of Pisa, I-56126 Pisa, Italy;
authors.forename: Lisandro
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Benedetti-Cecchi
authors.affiliation: Coral Reef Ecosystem Division, Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Honolulu, HI 96818;
authors.forename: Russell E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Brainard
authors.affiliation: Biocenter Grindel and Zoological Museum, University of Hamburg, 20146 Hamburg, Germany;
authors.forename: Angelika
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Brandt
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia, University of Pisa, I-56126 Pisa, Italy;
authors.forename: Fabio
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Bulleri
authors.affiliation: Norwegian Institute for Nature Research, FRAM-High North Research Centre for Climate and the Environment, 9296 Tromsø, Norway;
authors.forename: Kari E
authors.initials: KE
authors.lastname: Ellingsen
authors.affiliation: German Centre for Marine Biodiversity Research, Senckenberg am Meer, 26382 Wilhelmshaven, Germany;
authors.forename: Stefanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kaiser
authors.affiliation: Marine Research Department, Senckenberg am Meer, 26382 Wilhelmshaven, Germany;
authors.forename: Ingrid
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kröncke
authors.affiliation: British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge CB3 0ET, United Kingdom;
authors.forename: Katrin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Linse
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia, University of Pisa, I-56126 Pisa, Italy;
authors.forename: Elena
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Maggi
authors.affiliation: Museum Victoria, Melbourne, VIC 3001, Australia;
authors.forename: Timothy D
authors.initials: TD
authors.lastname: O'Hara
authors.affiliation: National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20013;
authors.forename: Laetitia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Plaisance
authors.affiliation: Museum Victoria, Melbourne, VIC 3001, Australia;
authors.forename: Gary C B
authors.initials: GC
authors.lastname: Poore
authors.affiliation: Department of Marine Science, University of Calcutta, Calcutta 700 019, India;
authors.forename: Santosh K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Sarkar
authors.affiliation: Environment and Safety Division, Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam 603 102, India; and.
authors.forename: Kamala K
authors.initials: KK
authors.lastname: Satpathy
authors.affiliation: Marine Research Department, Senckenberg am Meer, 26382 Wilhelmshaven, Germany;
authors.forename: Ulrike
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Schückel
authors.affiliation: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, Marine and Atmospheric Research, Marine Laboratories, Hobart, TAS 7001, Australia.
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.affiliation: Museum Victoria, Melbourne, VIC 3001, Australia;
authors.forename: Robin S
authors.initials: RS
authors.lastname: Wilson
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D044822:Biodiversity; D003081:Cold Climate; D005843:Geography; D008386:Marine Biology / Q000379:methods*; D008954:Models, Biological; D011156:Population Density; D011157:Population Dynamics; D013045:Species Specificity; D014329:Tropical Climate
keywords: Poisson-lognormal distribution; marine macroecology; metacommunities; species coexistence