Assembly Rules within a Contingent Ecology

作者：Lisa R. Belyea, Jill Lancaster · 发表于：Oikos · 年份：1999 · DOI：10.2307/3546646 · 被引用次数：562 · 研究领域：Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies、Plant and animal studies、Animal Ecology and Behavior Studies

Ecologists have searched for general principles, or assembly rules, which determine how species combine to form communities. Two major strands of research highlight the interaction of assembly rules operating at different levels of community organisation. and within uncertain local and historical contingencies. Here, we review the aterature on community assembly within the context of three principal determinants: dispersal constraints, environmental constraints and internal dynamics. This classification separates external factors (dispersal and environmental constraints) from mternal processes (internal dynamics). We assert that assembly rules are general, deterministic and mechanistic, and operate on internal dynamies within the constraints imposed by the local environment and the history of species invasions. Several assembly rules have been proposed to operate within and across trophic levels, as well as on whole systems. The rules act through resource dynamics and spatial dynamies to select species or subsets of species that can coexist, and may lead to patterns of increasing biomass and non-random spatial distributions. Environmental constraints restriet species establishment and mediate interactions among successful colonists; a change in environmental constraints, either exogenous or endogenous. may drive community change. Even in systems at equilibrium, environmental constraints influence the outcome of assembly rules. Dispersal constraints determine the pool of poten...