title: Community rescue in experimental metacommunities.
abstract: The conditions that allow biodiversity to recover following severe environmental degradation are poorly understood. We studied community rescue, the recovery of a viable community through the evolutionary rescue of many populations within an evolving community, in metacommunities of soil microbes adapting to a herbicide. The metacommunities occupied a landscape of crossed spatial gradients of the herbicide (Dalapon) and a resource (glucose), whereas their constituent communities were either isolated or connected by dispersal. The spread of adapted communities across the landscape and the persistence of communities when that landscape was degraded were strongly promoted by dispersal, and the capacity to adapt to lethal stress was also related to community size and initial diversity. After abrupt and lethal stress, community rescue was most frequent in communities that had previously experienced sublethal levels of stress and had been connected by dispersal. Community rescue occurred through the evolutionary rescue of both initially common taxa, which remained common, and of initially rare taxa, which grew to dominate the evolved community. Community rescue may allow productivity and biodiversity to recover from severe environmental degradation.
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, University of Essex, Colchester CO4 3SQ, United Kingdom;
authors.forename: Etienne
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-0413-567X
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Low-Décarie
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1.
authors.forename: Marcus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kolber
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1.
authors.forename: Paige
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Homme
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1.
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lofano
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, University of Essex, Colchester CO4 3SQ, United Kingdom;
authors.forename: Alex
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Dumbrell
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gonzalez
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1 graham.bell@mcgill.ca.
authors.forename: Graham
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Bell
mesh_terms: D001483:Base Sequence; D001673:Biodegradation, Environmental; D005075:Biological Evolution; D005947:Glucose / Q000378:metabolism*; D054892:Metagenome; D059013:Microbial Consortia; D008954:Models, Biological; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011422:Propionates / Q000378:metabolism*; D012987:Soil; D012988:Soil Microbiology
chemical_list: D011422:Propionates; D012987:Soil; D005947:Glucose; C004743:dalapon
keywords: environmental degradation; evolutionary rescue; microbial diversity; migration; toxicant