Ecology Letters

Our study provides a framework that links stoichiometric homeostasis with species performance and community function at the elementome level. We demonstrate that higher homeostasis of P, K, Ca and Na enhances species abundance, biomass, dominance and stability, as well as community biomass in wetland ecosystems. The conservative nutrient strategies of high homeostasis species are key mechanisms driving species performance and community functioning.

We conducted a meta-analysis using 266 effect sizes from 52 empirical papers on harvested aquatic species and determined the relationship between parasite-induced host mortality and temperature and how this relationship was altered by host, parasite, and study design traits. Overall, higher temperatures increased parasite-induced host mortality; however, the magnitude of this relationship varied.

Over 16 years of climate warming reduced alpine grasslands subsoil organic carbon content by 8.5%, whereas cooling increased it by 7.0%. Warming reduced carbon storage by directly increasing the fungal-to-bacterial biomass ratio and the gram-positive to gram-negative bacterial biomass ratio and indirectly decreasing the soil carbon-to-nitrogen ratio, whereas cooling enhanced carbon storage primarily by decreasing the fungal-to-bacterial biomass ratio. Conventional warming experiments may underestimate the negative effects of climate warming on subsoil organic carbon pools by neglecting the role of climate cooling.

Phylogenetic endemism is the most efficient single criterion to maximise global phylogenetic diversity within the smallest land area, and can be complemented with the spatial scaling of phylogenetic uniqueness which allows distinguishing globally distinct but regionally less unique sites ‘(evolutionary hills)’ from highly irreplaceable sites even at small scales ‘(evolutionary islands)’, which support lower local diversity but host species that are both evolutionarily unique and threatened.

Natural history gaps hinder our understanding of species' ecological roles and their contributions to ecosystem processes. Using an integrative framework, we analysed multiple niche dimensions of co-occurring xenarthran insectivores, revealing divergent trophic, spatial and temporal patterns that reflect distinct ecological roles. Our results challenge assumptions of ecological redundancy and underscore the importance of natural history data for understanding biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.