title: Convergence in Multispecies Interactions.
abstract: The concepts of convergent evolution and community convergence highlight how selective pressures can shape unrelated organisms or communities in similar ways. We propose a related concept, convergent interactions, to describe the independent evolution of multispecies interactions with similar physiological or ecological functions. A focus on convergent interactions clarifies how natural selection repeatedly favors particular kinds of associations among species. Characterizing convergent interactions in a comparative context is likely to facilitate prediction of the ecological roles of organisms (including microbes) in multispecies interactions and selective pressures acting in poorly understood or newly discovered multispecies systems. We illustrate the concept of convergent interactions with examples: vertebrates and their gut bacteria; ectomycorrhizae; insect-fungal-bacterial interactions; pitcher-plant food webs; and ants and ant-plants.
authors: Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 16 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA; Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, 26 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. Electronic address: lbittles@fas.harvard.edu.
authors: Leonora S
authors: LS
authors: Bittleston
authors: Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 16 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA; Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, 26 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
authors: Naomi E
authors: NE
authors: Pierce
authors: Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 16 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA; Harvard Forest, Harvard University, 324 North Main Street, Petersham, MA 01366, USA.
authors: Aaron M
authors: AM
authors: Ellison
authors: Departments of Bacteriology and Botany, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 430 Lincoln Drive, Madison, WI 53706, USA.
authors: Anne
authors: A
authors: Pringle
mesh_terms: D000220:Adaptation, Biological; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D020387:Food Chain; D064307:Microbiota; D010944:Plants; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D013559:Symbiosis
keywords: community ecology; convergent evolution; microbe; mutualism; symbiosis