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Published November 13, 2022 | Version Abstract
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A trait-based approach to marine island biogeography

  • 1. Center of Marine Biology, University of São Paulo
  • 2. Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina
  • 3. Institut Universitaire de France

Description

Abstract

Aim: The Island Biogeography Theory (IBT) and its multiple extensions have been widely recognized as pivotal for explaining species diversity patterns in insular systems. However, how these theories can predict the functional diversity patterns in island systems remains challenging. Here, we evaluated the predicions of the IBT, the General Dynamic Theory of Oceanic Island Biogeography (GDM), and the Glacial-sensitive model of Island Biogeography (GSM) considering not only the number of species but also the diversity of functional (or functional diversity) of reef fishes on oceanic islands.

Location: Tropical oceanic islands.

Major taxa studied: Actinopterygii.

Methods: We combined literature data and online repositories to gather occurrence data and traits of reef fish species for 72 tropical oceanic islands worldwide. We then calculated five indices characterizing the functional diversity of species assemblages (i.e., functional richness 'FRic', functional evenness 'FEve', functional divergence 'FDiv', functional over-redundancy 'FOR', and functional vulnerability 'FVul'). We used Generalized Additive Mixed Models to explore relationships among species richness and functional indices. Further, we built Bayesian models with Gaussian distribution to evaluate relationships between the functional indices and several island features (i.e., isolation from the near reef, past and present reef area, and geological age) and two geographical isolation measures which encompass past and contemporary isolation levels (i.e., isolation from Quaternary refugia and isolation from biodiversity centres).

Results: We observed higher levels of FRic, FDiv, and FOR on the Indo-Pacific islands, whereas FEve and FVul showed higher values on the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific islands. We identified positive correlations between FRic, FDiv, and FOR with species richness but negative relationships with FEve and FVul. We also found that past and current reef areas best explained variation in functional diversity indices among islands. Isolation from Quaternary refugia positively influenced on FEve and FVul, but negatively FRic. Isolation from the nearest reef area followed the same trends. We did not observe any effect of island age or distance to present biodiversity centres on functional indices.

Main conclusions: Reef fish assemblages on tropical oceanic islands exhibited a range of differences in functional indices worldwide, which can be related to differences in evolutionary history among biogeographical regions. Furthermore, our results showed past and current reef area as the best predictors of reef fish functional diversity in tropical oceanic islands, extending the IBT, GDM, and GSM for marine organisms within a trait-based framework.

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