Mutualisms weaken the latitudinal diversity gradient among oceanic islands.

The latitudinal diversity gradient (LDG) dominates global patterns of diversity1,2, but the factors that underlie the LDG remain elusive. Here we use a unique global dataset3 to show that vascular plants on oceanic islands exhibit a weakened LDG and explore potential mechanisms for this effect. Our results show that traditional physical drivers of island biogeography4-namely area and isolation-contribute to the difference between island and mainland diversity at a given latitude (that is, the island species deficit), as smaller and more distant islands experience reduced colonization. However, plant species with mutualists are underrepresented on islands, and we find that this plant mutualism filter explains more variation in the island species deficit than abiotic factors. In particular, plant species that require animal pollinators or microbial mutualists such as arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi contribute disproportionately to the island species deficit near the Equator, with contributions decreasing with distance from the Equator. Plant mutualist filters on species richness are particularly strong at low absolute latitudes where mainland richness is highest, weakening the LDG of oceanic islands. These results provide empirical evidence that mutualisms, habitat heterogeneity and dispersal are key to the maintenance of high tropical plant diversity and mediate the biogeographic patterns of plant diversity on Earth.

Islands are key for protecting the world's plant endemism.

Islands are renowned as evolutionary laboratories and support many species that are not found elsewhere1,2. Islands are also of great conservation concern, with many of their endemic species currently threatened or extinct3. Here we present a standardized checklist of all known vascular plants that occur on islands and document their geographical and phylogenetic distribution and conservation risk. Our analyses of 304,103 plant species reveal that 94,052 species (31%) are native to islands, which constitute 5.3% of the global landmass4. Of these, 63,280 are island endemic species, which represent 21% of global plant diversity. Three-quarters of these are restricted to large or isolated islands. Compared with the world flora, island endemics are non-randomly distributed within the tree of life, with a total of 1,005 billion years of unique phylogenetic history with 17 families and 1,702 genera being entirely endemic to islands. Of all vascular plants assigned International Union for Conservation of Nature conservation categories5, 22% are island endemics. Among these endemic species, 51% are threatened, and 55% of all documented global extinctions have occurred on islands. We find that of all single-island endemic species, only 6% occur on islands meeting the United Nations 30×30 conservation target. Urgent measures including habitat restoration, invasive species removal and ex situ programmes are needed to protect the world's island flora. Our checklist quantifies the uniqueness of island life, provides a basis for future studies of island floras, and highlights the urgent need to take actions for conserving them.

Assembly of functional diversity in an oceanic island flora.

Oceanic island floras are well known for their morphological peculiarities and exhibit striking examples of trait evolution1-3. These morphological shifts are commonly attributed to insularity and are thought to be shaped by the biogeographical processes and evolutionary histories of oceanic islands2,4. However, the mechanisms through which biogeography and evolution have shaped the distribution and diversity of plant functional traits remain unclear5. Here we describe the functional trait space of the native flora of an oceanic island (Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain) using extensive field and laboratory measurements, and relate it to global trade-offs in ecological strategies. We find that the island trait space exhibits a remarkable functional richness but that most plants are concentrated around a functional hotspot dominated by shrubs with a conservative life-history strategy. By dividing the island flora into species groups associated with distinct biogeographical distributions and diversification histories, our results also suggest that colonization via long-distance dispersal and the interplay between inter-island dispersal and archipelago-level speciation processes drive functional divergence and trait space expansion. Contrary to our expectations, speciation via cladogenesis has led to functional convergence, and therefore only contributes marginally to functional diversity by densely packing trait space around shrubs. By combining biogeography, ecology and evolution, our approach opens new avenues for trait-based insights into how dispersal, speciation and persistence shape the assembly of entire native island floras.

Climatic stability and geological history shape global centers of neo- and paleoendemism in seed plants.

Assessing the distribution of geographically restricted and evolutionarily unique species and their underlying drivers is key to understanding biogeographical processes and critical for global conservation prioritization. Here, we quantified the geographic distribution and drivers of phylogenetic endemism for ~320,000 seed plants worldwide and identified centers and drivers of evolutionarily young (neoendemism) and evolutionarily old endemism (paleoendemism). Tropical and subtropical islands as well as tropical mountain regions displayed the world's highest phylogenetic endemism. Most tropical rainforest regions emerged as centers of paleoendemism, while most Mediterranean-climate regions showed high neoendemism. Centers where high neo- and paleoendemism coincide emerged on some oceanic and continental fragment islands, in Mediterranean-climate regions and parts of the Irano-Turanian floristic region. Global variation in phylogenetic endemism was well explained by a combination of past and present environmental factors (79.8 to 87.7% of variance explained) and most strongly related to environmental heterogeneity. Also, warm and wet climates, geographic isolation, and long-term climatic stability emerged as key drivers of phylogenetic endemism. Neo- and paleoendemism were jointly explained by climatic and geological history. Long-term climatic stability promoted the persistence of paleoendemics, while the isolation of oceanic islands and their unique geological histories promoted neoendemism. Mountainous regions promoted both neo- and paleoendemism, reflecting both diversification and persistence over time. Our study provides insights into the evolutionary underpinnings of biogeographical patterns in seed plants and identifies the areas on Earth with the highest evolutionary and biogeographical uniqueness-key information for setting global conservation priorities.

The evolution of insular woodiness.

Insular woodiness (IW)-the evolutionary transition from herbaceousness toward woodiness on islands-is one of the most iconic features of island floras. Since pioneering work by Darwin and Wallace, a number of drivers of IW have been proposed, such as 1) competition for sunlight requiring plants with taller and stronger woody stems and 2) drought favoring woodiness to safeguard root-to-shoot water transport. Alternatively, IW may be the indirect result of increased lifespan related to 3) a favorable aseasonal climate and/or 4) a lack of large native herbivores. However, information on the occurrence of IW is fragmented, hampering tests of these potential drivers. Here, we identify 1,097 insular woody species on 375 islands and infer at least 175 evolutionary transitions on 31 archipelagos, concentrated in six angiosperm families. Structural equation models reveal that the insular woody species richness on oceanic islands correlates with a favorable aseasonal climate, followed by increased drought and island isolation (approximating competition). When continental islands are also included, reduced herbivory pressure by large native mammals, increased drought, and island isolation are most relevant. Our results illustrate different trajectories leading to rampant convergent evolution toward IW and further emphasize archipelagos as natural laboratories of evolution, where similar abiotic or biotic conditions replicated evolution of similar traits.

Regional invasion history and land use shape the prevalence of non-native species in local assemblages.

The ecological impact of non-native species arises from their establishment in local assemblages. However, the rates of non-native spread in new regions and their determinants have not been comprehensively studied. Here, we combined global databases documenting the occurrence of non-native species and residence of non-native birds, mammals, and vascular plants at regional and local scales to describe how the likelihood of non-native occurrence and their proportion in local assemblages relate with their residence time and levels of human usage in different ecosystems. Our findings reveal that local non-native occurrence generally increases with residence time. Colonization is most rapid in croplands and urban areas, while it is slower and variable in natural or semi-natural ecosystems. Notably, non-native occurrence continues to rise even 200 years after introduction, especially for birds and vascular plants, and in other land-use types rather than croplands and urban areas. The impact of residence time on non-native proportions is significant only for mammals. We conclude that the continental exchange of biotas requires considerable time for effects to manifest at the local scale across taxa and land-use types. The unpredictability of future impacts, implied by the slow spread of non-native species, strengthens the call for stronger regulations on the exchange of non-native species to reduce the long-lasting invasion debt looming on ecosystems' future.

Dimensions of invasiveness: Links between local abundance, geographic range size, and habitat breadth in Europe's alien and native floras.

Understanding drivers of success for alien species can inform on potential future invasions. Recent conceptual advances highlight that species may achieve invasiveness via performance along at least three distinct dimensions: 1) local abundance, 2) geographic range size, and 3) habitat breadth in naturalized distributions. Associations among these dimensions and the factors that determine success in each have yet to be assessed at large geographic scales. Here, we combine data from over one million vegetation plots covering the extent of Europe and its habitat diversity with databases on species' distributions, traits, and historical origins to provide a comprehensive assessment of invasiveness dimensions for the European alien seed plant flora. Invasiveness dimensions are linked in alien distributions, leading to a continuum from overall poor invaders to super invaders-abundant, widespread aliens that invade diverse habitats. This pattern echoes relationships among analogous dimensions measured for native European species. Success along invasiveness dimensions was associated with details of alien species' introduction histories: earlier introduction dates were positively associated with all three dimensions, and consistent with theory-based expectations, species originating from other continents, particularly acquisitive growth strategists, were among the most successful invaders in Europe. Despite general correlations among invasiveness dimensions, we identified habitats and traits associated with atypical patterns of success in only one or two dimensions-for example, the role of disturbed habitats in facilitating widespread specialists. We conclude that considering invasiveness within a multidimensional framework can provide insights into invasion processes while also informing general understanding of the dynamics of species distributions.

Spatial variability in herbaceous plant phenology is mostly explained by variability in temperature but also by photoperiod and functional traits.

Whereas temporal variability of plant phenology in response to climate change has already been well studied, the spatial variability of phenology is not well understood. Given that phenological shifts may affect biotic interactions, there is a need to investigate how the variability in environmental factors relates to the spatial variability in herbaceous species' phenology by at the same time considering their functional traits to predict their general and species-specific responses to future climate change. In this project, we analysed phenology records of 148 herbaceous species, which were observed for a single year by the PhenObs network in 15 botanical gardens. For each species, we characterised the spatial variability in six different phenological stages across gardens. We used boosted regression trees to link these variabilities in phenology to the variability in environmental parameters (temperature, latitude and local habitat conditions) as well as species traits (seed mass, vegetative height, specific leaf area and temporal niche) hypothesised to be related to phenology variability. We found that spatial variability in the phenology of herbaceous species was mainly driven by the variability in temperature but also photoperiod was an important driving factor for some phenological stages. In addition, we found that early-flowering and less competitive species characterised by small specific leaf area and vegetative height were more variable in their phenology. Our findings contribute to the field of phenology by showing that besides temperature, photoperiod and functional traits are important to be included when spatial variability of herbaceous species is investigated.

Links to rare climates do not translate into distinct traits for island endemics.

Current models of island biogeography treat endemic and non-endemic species as if they were functionally equivalent, focussing primarily on species richness. Thus, the functional composition of island biotas in relation to island biogeographical variables remains largely unknown. Using plant trait data (plant height, leaf area and flower length) for 895 native species in the Canary Islands, we related functional trait distinctiveness and climate rarity for endemic and non-endemic species and island ages. Endemics showed a link to climatically rare conditions that is consistent with island geological change through time. However, functional trait distinctiveness did not differ between endemics and non-endemics and remained constant with island age. Thus, there is no obvious link between trait distinctiveness and occupancy of rare climates, at least for the traits measured here, suggesting that treating endemic and non-endemic species as functionally equivalent in island biogeography is not fundamentally wrong.

The contribution of plant life and growth forms to global gradients of vascular plant diversity.

Plant life and growth forms (shortened to 'plant forms') represent key functional strategies of plants in relation to their environment and provide important insights into the ecological constraints acting on the distribution of biodiversity. Despite their functional importance, how the spectra of plant forms contribute to global gradients of plant diversity is unresolved. Using a novel dataset comprising > 295 000 species, we quantify the contribution of different plant forms to global gradients of vascular plant diversity. Furthermore, we establish how plant form distributions in different biogeographical regions are associated with contemporary and paleoclimate conditions, environmental heterogeneity and phylogeny. We find a major shift in representation of woody perennials in tropical latitudes to herb-dominated floras in temperate and boreal regions, following a sharp latitudinal gradient in plant form diversity from the tropics to the poles. We also find significant functional differences between regions, mirroring life and growth form responses to environmental conditions, which is mostly explained by contemporary climate (18-87%), and phylogeny (6-62%), with paleoclimate and heterogeneity playing a lesser role (< 23%). This research highlights variation in the importance of different plant forms to diversity gradients world-wide, shedding light on the ecological and evolutionary pressures constraining plant-trait distributions.

Small genome size and variation in ploidy levels support the naturalization of vascular plants but constrain their invasive spread.

Karyological characteristics are among the traits underpinning the invasion success of vascular plants. Using 11 049 species, we tested the effects of genome size and ploidy levels on plant naturalization (species forming self-sustaining populations where they are not native) and invasion (naturalized species spreading rapidly and having environmental impact). The probability that a species naturalized anywhere in the world decreased with increasing monoploid genome size (DNA content of a single chromosome set). Naturalized or invasive species with intermediate monoploid genomes were reported from many regions, but those with either small or large genomes occurred in fewer regions. By contrast, large holoploid genome sizes (DNA content of the unreplicated gametic nucleus) constrained naturalization but favoured invasion. We suggest that a small genome is an advantage during naturalization, being linked to traits favouring adaptation to local conditions, but for invasive spread, traits associated with a large holoploid genome, where the impact of polyploidy may act, facilitate long-distance dispersal and competition with other species.

Global models and predictions of plant diversity based on advanced machine learning techniques.

Despite the paramount role of plant diversity for ecosystem functioning, biogeochemical cycles, and human welfare, knowledge of its global distribution is still incomplete, hampering basic research and biodiversity conservation. Here, we used machine learning (random forests, extreme gradient boosting, and neural networks) and conventional statistical methods (generalized linear models and generalized additive models) to test environment-related hypotheses of broad-scale vascular plant diversity gradients and to model and predict species richness and phylogenetic richness worldwide. To this end, we used 830 regional plant inventories including c. 300 000 species and predictors of past and present environmental conditions. Machine learning showed a superior performance, explaining up to 80.9% of species richness and 83.3% of phylogenetic richness, illustrating the great potential of such techniques for disentangling complex and interacting associations between the environment and plant diversity. Current climate and environmental heterogeneity emerged as the primary drivers, while past environmental conditions left only small but detectable imprints on plant diversity. Finally, we combined predictions from multiple modeling techniques (ensemble predictions) to reveal global patterns and centers of plant diversity at multiple resolutions down to 7774 km2 . Our predictive maps provide accurate estimates of global plant diversity available at grain sizes relevant for conservation and macroecology.

Biodiversity data integration-the significance of data resolution and domain.

Recent years have seen an explosion in the availability of biodiversity data describing the distribution, function, and evolutionary history of life on earth. Integrating these heterogeneous data remains a challenge due to large variations in observational scales, collection purposes, and terminologies. Here, we conceptualize widely used biodiversity data types according to their domain (what aspect of biodiversity is described?) and informational resolution (how specific is the description?). Applying this framework to major data providers in biodiversity research reveals a strong focus on the disaggregated end of the data spectrum, whereas aggregated data types remain largely underutilized. We discuss the implications of this imbalance for the scope and representativeness of current macroecological research and highlight the synergies arising from a tighter integration of biodiversity data across domains and resolutions. We lay out effective strategies for data collection, mobilization, imputation, and sharing and summarize existing frameworks for scalable and integrative biodiversity research. Finally, we use two case studies to demonstrate how the explicit consideration of data domain and resolution helps to identify biases and gaps in global data sets and achieve unprecedented taxonomic and geographical data coverage in macroecological analyses.

Late Quaternary climate change shapes island biodiversity.

Island biogeographical models consider islands either as geologically static with biodiversity resulting from ecologically neutral immigration-extinction dynamics, or as geologically dynamic with biodiversity resulting from immigration-speciation-extinction dynamics influenced by changes in island characteristics over millions of years. Present climate and spatial arrangement of islands, however, are rather exceptional compared to most of the Late Quaternary, which is characterized by recurrent cooler and drier glacial periods. These climatic oscillations over short geological timescales strongly affected sea levels and caused massive changes in island area, isolation and connectivity, orders of magnitude faster than the geological processes of island formation, subsidence and erosion considered in island theory. Consequences of these oscillations for present biodiversity remain unassessed. Here we analyse the effects of present and Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) island area, isolation, elevation and climate on key components of angiosperm diversity on islands worldwide. We find that post-LGM changes in island characteristics, especially in area, have left a strong imprint on present diversity of endemic species. Specifically, the number and proportion of endemic species today is significantly higher on islands that were larger during the LGM. Native species richness, in turn, is mostly determined by present island characteristics. We conclude that an appreciation of Late Quaternary environmental change is essential to understand patterns of island endemism and its underlying evolutionary dynamics.

Persistent soil seed banks promote naturalisation and invasiveness in flowering plants.

With globalisation facilitating the movement of plants and seeds beyond the native range, preventing potentially harmful introductions requires knowledge of what drives the successful establishment and spread of alien plants. Here, we examined global-scale relationships between naturalisation success (incidence and extent) and invasiveness, soil seed bank properties (type and densities) and key species traits (seed mass, seed dormancy and life form) for 2350 species of angiosperms. Naturalisation and invasiveness were strongly associated with the ability to form persistent (vs. transient) seed banks but relatively weakly with seed bank densities and other traits. Our findings suggest that seed bank persistence is a trait that better captures the ability to become naturalised and invasive compared to seed traits more widely available in trait databases. Knowledge of seed persistence can contribute to our ability to predict global naturalisation and invasiveness and to identify potentially invasive flowering plants before they are introduced.

Role of diversification rates and evolutionary history as a driver of plant naturalization success.

Human introductions of species beyond their natural ranges and their subsequent establishment are defining features of global environmental change. However, naturalized plants are not uniformly distributed across phylogenetic lineages, with some families contributing disproportionately more to the global alien species pool than others. Additionally, lineages differ in diversification rates, and high diversification rates have been associated with characteristics that increase species naturalization success. Here, we investigate the role of diversification rates in explaining the naturalization success of angiosperm plant families. We use five global data sets that include native and alien plant species distribution, horticultural use of plants, and a time-calibrated angiosperm phylogeny. Using phylogenetic generalized linear mixed models, we analysed the effect of diversification rate, different geographical range measures, and horticultural use on the naturalization success of plant families. We show that a family's naturalization success is positively associated with its evolutionary history, native range size, and economic use. Investigating interactive effects of these predictors shows that native range size and geographic distribution additionally affect naturalization success. High diversification rates and large ranges increase naturalization success, especially of temperate families. We suggest this may result from lower ecological specialization in temperate families with large ranges, compared with tropical families with smaller ranges.

Global exchange and accumulation of non-native plants.

All around the globe, humans have greatly altered the abiotic and biotic environment with ever-increasing speed. One defining feature of the Anthropocene epoch is the erosion of biogeographical barriers by human-mediated dispersal of species into new regions, where they can naturalize and cause ecological, economic and social damage. So far, no comprehensive analysis of the global accumulation and exchange of alien plant species between continents has been performed, primarily because of a lack of data. Here we bridge this knowledge gap by using a unique global database on the occurrences of naturalized alien plant species in 481 mainland and 362 island regions. In total, 13,168 plant species, corresponding to 3.9% of the extant global vascular flora, or approximately the size of the native European flora, have become naturalized somewhere on the globe as a result of human activity. North America has accumulated the largest number of naturalized species, whereas the Pacific Islands show the fastest increase in species numbers with respect to their land area. Continents in the Northern Hemisphere have been the major donors of naturalized alien species to all other continents. Our results quantify for the first time the extent of plant naturalizations worldwide, and illustrate the urgent need for globally integrated efforts to control, manage and understand the spread of alien species.

Remoteness promotes biological invasions on islands worldwide.

One of the best-known general patterns in island biogeography is the species-isolation relationship (SIR), a decrease in the number of native species with increasing island isolation that is linked to lower rates of natural dispersal and colonization on remote oceanic islands. However, during recent centuries, the anthropogenic introduction of alien species has increasingly gained importance and altered the composition and richness of island species pools. We analyzed a large dataset for alien and native plants, ants, reptiles, mammals, and birds on 257 (sub) tropical islands, and showed that, except for birds, the number of naturalized alien species increases with isolation for all taxa, a pattern that is opposite to the negative SIR of native species. We argue that the reversal of the SIR for alien species is driven by an increase in island invasibility due to reduced diversity and increased ecological naiveté of native biota on the more remote islands.

Similar factors underlie tree abundance in forests in native and alien ranges.

AIM: Alien plant species can cause severe ecological and economic problems, and therefore attract a lot of research interest in biogeography and related fields. To identify potential future invasive species, we need to better understand the mechanisms underlying the abundances of invasive tree species in their new ranges, and whether these mechanisms differ between their native and alien ranges. Here, we test two hypotheses: that greater relative abundance is promoted by (a) functional difference from locally co-occurring trees, and (b) higher values than locally co-occurring trees for traits linked to competitive ability. LOCATION: Global. TIME PERIOD: Recent. MAJOR TAXA STUDIED: Trees. METHODS: We combined three global plant databases: sPlot vegetation-plot database, TRY plant trait database and Global Naturalized Alien Flora (GloNAF) database. We used a hierarchical Bayesian linear regression model to assess the factors associated with variation in local abundance, and how these relationships vary between native and alien ranges and depend on species' traits. RESULTS: In both ranges, species reach highest abundance if they are functionally similar to co-occurring species, yet are taller and have higher seed mass and wood density than co-occurring species. MAIN CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that light limitation leads to strong environmental and biotic filtering, and that it is advantageous to be taller and have denser wood. The striking similarities in abundance between native and alien ranges imply that information from tree species' native ranges can be used to predict in which habitats introduced species may become dominant.

Naturalization of European plants on other continents: The role of donor habitats.

The success of European plant species as aliens worldwide is thought to reflect their association with human-disturbed environments. However, an explicit test including all human-made, seminatural and natural habitat types of Europe, and their contributions as donor habitats of naturalized species to the rest of the globe, has been missing. Here we combine two databases, the European Vegetation Checklist and the Global Naturalized Alien Flora, to assess how human influence in European habitats affects the probability of naturalization of their plant species on other continents. A total of 9,875 native European vascular plant species were assigned to 39 European habitat types; of these, 2,550 species have become naturalized somewhere in the world. Species that occur in both human-made habitats and seminatural or natural habitats in Europe have the highest probability of naturalization (64.7% and 64.5% of them have naturalized). Species associated only with human-made or seminatural habitats still have a significantly higher probability of becoming naturalized (41.7% and 28.6%, respectively) than species confined to natural habitats (19.4%). Species associated with arable land and human settlements were recorded as naturalized in the largest number of regions worldwide. Our findings highlight that plant species' association with native-range habitats disturbed by human activities, combined with broad habitat range, play an important role in shaping global patterns of plant invasions.