Browsing by Autor "Rachel Stubbington"

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A global analysis of terrestrial plant litter dynamics in non-perennial waterways
(Nature Portfolio, 2018) Thibault Datry; Arnaud Foulquier; Roland Corti; Daniel von Schiller; Klement Tockner; Clara Mendoza‐Lera; Jean‐Christophe Clément; Mark O. Gessner; Marcos Moleón; Rachel Stubbington
Author Correction: A global analysis of terrestrial plant litter dynamics in non-perennial waterways
(Nature Portfolio, 2018) Thibault Datry; Arnaud Foulquier; Roland Corti; Daniel von Schiller; Klement Tockner; Clara Mendoza‐Lera; Jean‐Christophe Clément; Mark O. Gessner; Marcos Moleón; Rachel Stubbington
River Drying Causes Local Losses and Regional Gains in Aquatic Invertebrate Metacommunity Diversity: A Cross‐Continental Comparison
(Wiley, 2025) Daniel Escobar‐Camacho; Julie Crabot; Rachel Stubbington; Judy England; Romain Sarremejane; Núria Bonada‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬; José María Fernández‐Calero; Miguel Cañedo‐Argüelles; Carla Ferreira Rezende; Pierre C. M. Chanut
Drying river networks include non-perennial reaches that cease to flow or dry, and drying is becoming more prevalent with ongoing climate change. Biodiversity responses to drying have been explored mostly at local scales in a few regions, such as Europe and North America, limiting our ability to predict future global scenarios of freshwater biodiversity. Locally, drying acts as a strong environmental filter that selects for species with adaptations promoting resistance or resilience to desiccation, thus reducing aquatic α-diversity. At the river network scale, drying generates complex mosaics of dry and wet habitats, shaping metacommunities driven by both environmental and dispersal processes. By repeatedly resetting community succession, drying can enhance β-diversity in space and time. To investigate the transferability of these concepts across continents, we compiled and analyzed a unique dataset of 43 aquatic invertebrate metacommunities from drying river networks in Europe and South America. In Europe, α-diversity was consistently lower in non-perennial than perennial reaches, whereas this pattern was not evident in South America. Concomitantly, β-diversity was higher in non-perennial reaches than in perennial ones in Europe but not in South America. In general, β-diversity was predominantly driven by turnover rather than nestedness. Dispersal was the main driver of metacommunity dynamics, challenging prevailing views in river science that environmental filtering is the primary process shaping aquatic metacommunities. Lastly, α-diversity decreased as drying duration increased, but this was not consistent across Europe. Overall, drying had continent-specific effects, suggesting limited transferability of knowledge accumulated from North America and Europe to other biogeographic regions. As climate change intensifies, river drying is increasing, and our results underscore the importance of studying its effects across different regions. The importance of dispersal also suggests that management efforts should seek to enhance connectivity between reaches to effectively monitor, restore and conserve freshwater biodiversity.
Unravelling large-scale patterns and drivers of biodiversity in dry rivers
(2023) Arnaud Foulquier; Thibault Datry; Roland Corti; Daniel von Schiller; Klement Tockner; Rachel Stubbington; Mark O. Gessner; Frédéric Boyer; Marc Ohlmann; Wilfried Thuiller
<title>Abstract</title> The lack of data from non-perennial rivers, which regularly cease to flow and dry up, poses a significant challenge in understanding river biodiversity. These dynamic ecosystems, accounting for over half of the global river network, remain understudied. To address this gap, we conducted a coordinated experiment and a metabarcoding approach on environmental DNA targeting multiple taxa (i.e. Archaea, Bacteria, Fungi, Algae, Protozoa, Nematoda, Arthropoda and Streptophyta). Dry sediments were collected from 84 non-perennial rivers across 19 countries on five continents to investigate biodiversity patterns and drivers. Our findings reveal that both direct (e.g., nutrient and carbon availability) and indirect (e.g., latitude and climate) drivers significantly influence local biodiversity for most taxa. In particular, we observed that low resource availability and extended dry phases promote the prevalence of oligotrophic microbial taxa, similar to soil microbial communities during drought events. Interestingly, our inferred partial correlation networks indicate that covariation among taxa, particularly Bacteria, Fungi, Algae, and Protozoa, plays a more substantial role in explaining variations in community composition than abiotic gradients. This unexpected result suggests that biotic interactions may drive community assembly in non-perennial rivers, potentially shaping biodiversity responses in the face of global changes like warming and altered hydrological patterns.
Unravelling large-scale patterns and drivers of biodiversity in dry rivers
(Nature Portfolio, 2024) Arnaud Foulquier; Thibault Datry; Roland Corti; Daniel von Schiller; Klement Tockner; Rachel Stubbington; Mark O. Gessner; Frédéric Boyer; Marc Ohlmann; Wilfried Thuiller