title: Reintroducing Environmental Change Drivers in Biodiversity-Ecosystem Functioning Research.
abstract: For the past 20 years, research on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning (B-EF) has only implicitly considered the underlying role of environmental change. We illustrate that explicitly reintroducing environmental change drivers in B-EF research is needed to predict the functioning of ecosystems facing changes in biodiversity. Next we show how this reintroduction improves experimental control over community composition and structure, which helps to provide mechanistic insight on how multiple aspects of biodiversity relate to function and how biodiversity and function relate in food webs. We also highlight challenges for the proposed reintroduction and suggest analyses and experiments to better understand how random biodiversity changes, as studied by classic approaches in B-EF research, contribute to the shifts in function that follow environmental change.
authors.affiliation: Research Unit in Environmental and Evolutionary Biology, University of Namur, Namur, Belgium. Electronic address: Frederik.delaender@unamur.be.
authors.forename: Frederik
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: De Laender
authors.affiliation: Department of Integrative Biology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA.
authors.forename: Jason R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Rohr
authors.affiliation: Environment Department, University of York, York, UK.
authors.forename: Roman
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Ashauer
authors.affiliation: Environment Canada, Canadian Rivers Institute, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, Canada.
authors.forename: Donald J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Baird
authors.affiliation: Institute of Forest Growth and Computer Sciences, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Uta
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Berger
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biology, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany; German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Nico
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Eisenhauer
authors.affiliation: German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany; Department of Ecological Modelling, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Volker
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Grimm
authors.affiliation: Fraunhofer Institute for Molecular Biology and Applied Ecology, Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Udo
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Hommen
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: Lorraine
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Maltby
authors.affiliation: Center for Ecology, Evolution, and Biogeochemistry, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Kastanienbaum, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Carlos J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Meliàn
authors.affiliation: Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Department of Aquatic Ecology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Pomati
authors.affiliation: Alterra, Wageningen University and Research Centre, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Ivo
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Roessink
authors.affiliation: German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany; Department of Evolutionary Ecology, Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Berlin, Germany.
authors.forename: Viktoriia
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Radchuk
authors.affiliation: Alterra, Wageningen University and Research Centre, Wageningen, The Netherlands; Department of Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Paul J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Van den Brink
mesh_terms: D044822:Biodiversity; D017753:Ecosystem; D020387:Food Chain; D012106:Research
keywords: biodiversity; environmental change; food webs; modeling; richness; traits