Patterns of species diversity and phylogenetic structure of vascular plants on the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

Large-scale patterns of species richness and the underlying mechanisms regulating these patterns have long been the central issues in biogeography and macroecology. Phylogenetic community structure is a result of combined effects of contemporary ecological interactions, environmental filtering, and evolutionary history, and it links community ecology with biogeography and trait evolution. The Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau provides a good opportunity to test the influence of contemporary climate on shaping species richness because of its unique geological history, cold climate, and high biodiversity. In this study, based on high-resolution distributions of ˜9000 vascular plant species, we explored how species richness and phylogenetic structure of vascular plants correlate with climates on the highest (and species rich) plateau on the Earth. The results showed that most of the vascular plants were distributed on the eastern part of the plateau; there was a strong association between species richness and climate, even after the effects of habitat heterogeneity were controlled. However, the responses of richness to climate remarkably depended on life-forms. Richness of woody plants showed stronger climatic associations than that of herbaceous plants; energy and water availability together regulated richness pattern of woody plants; whereas water availability predominantly regulated richness pattern of herbaceous plants. The phylogenetic structure of vascular species clustered in most areas of the plateau, suggesting that rapid speciation and environment filtering dominated the assembly of communities on the plateau. We further propose that biodiversity conservation in this area should better take into account ecological features for different life-forms and phylogenetic lineages.

Evolutionary history of passerine birds (Aves: Passeriformes) from the Qinghai–Tibetan plateau: from a pre-Quarternary perspective to an integrative biodiversity assessment

“…The same differences of biodiversity indices among regions were found when comparing species richness hotspots of the Qilian and Hengduan mountains with those of the Western Himalayas and Central Asian mountains and the northern Chinese plains ; data for threatened birds only!). Furthermore, a similar longitudinal species richness gradient was recently confirmed for vascular plants having a higher diversity in the eastern QTP region (Yang et al 2013).…”

Environmental Filtering Process Has More Important Roles than Dispersal Limitation in Shaping Large-Scale Prokaryotic Beta Diversity Patterns of Grassland Soils

“…Species turnover of amphibians and birds was strongly influenced by the environment mediated by range sizes and regional history [11]. Moreover, climatic gradient, topographic complexity, geographic variation (from gradual changes to abrupt transitions), ecological interactions, and biogeographic history (including dispersal barriers) can also have important roles in shaping beta diversity of macroorganisms [12][13][14][15][16]. However, the pattern of beta diversity of microorganisms is still scant, although several recent researches have examined the microbial beta diversity of some soils [17][18][19][20].…”

Tropical Refuges with Exceptionally High Phylogenetic Diversity Reveal Contrasting Phylogenetic Structures

“…However, PD and PS are complementary measures of biodiversity and can be properly used for biogeography, ecology, and conservation biology. Phylogenetics has been used to assess historical and ecological drivers at different spatial scales [12,18], from latitudinal gradient of species richness (SR) [24], biogeographic processes during the Cenozoic [25], and coastal dune ecosystem [26] at a global scale to habitat heterogeneity [27,28], successional pathways [29], and altitudinal gradient [30] at regional or, mainly, local scales. Although Brazil harbours the richest flora in the world, with more than 32,000 species of angiosperms [31], studies applying phylogeny to interpret plant composition (e.g., [32,33]) are still scarce.…”