title: Cascading effects of artificial light at night: resource-mediated control of herbivores in a grassland ecosystem.
abstract: Artificial light at night has a wide range of biological effects on both plants and animals. Here, we review mechanisms by which artificial light at night may restructure ecological communities by modifying the interactions between species. Such mechanisms may be top-down (predator, parasite or grazer controlled), bottom-up (resource-controlled) or involve non-trophic processes, such as pollination, seed dispersal or competition. We present results from an experiment investigating both top-down and bottom-up effects of artificial light at night on the population density of pea aphids Acyrthosiphon pisum in a diverse artificial grassland community in the presence and absence of predators and under low-level light of different spectral composition. We found no evidence for top-down control of A. pisum in this system, but did find evidence for bottom-up effects mediated through the impact of light on flower head density in a leguminous food plant. These results suggest that physiological effects of light on a plant species within a diverse plant community can have detectable demographic effects on a specialist herbivore.
authors.affiliation: Environment and Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK.
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bennie
authors.affiliation: Environment and Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK.
authors.forename: Thomas W
authors.initials: TW
authors.lastname: Davies
authors.affiliation: Environment and Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Cruse
authors.affiliation: Environment and Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK.
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Inger
authors.affiliation: Environment and Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK k.j.gaston@exeter.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Kevin J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Gaston
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001042:Aphids / Q000502:physiology*; D002940:Circadian Rhythm / Q000528:radiation effects*; D001517:Coleoptera / Q000502:physiology*; D003116:Color; D004784:Environmental Monitoring; D004787:Environmental Pollution; D020387:Food Chain; D065948:Grassland; D060434:Herbivory; D008029:Lighting; D000070116:Lotus / Q000502:physiology / Q000528:radiation effects; D009792:Oceans and Seas
keywords: artificial light at night; biotic interactions; bottom-up effects; community-level; light pollution; photopollution