Accelerated increase in plant species richness on mountain summits is linked to warming

First author: Manuel J. Steinbauer; Affiliations: Aarhus University (丹麦奥胡斯大学): Aarhus, Denmark

Corresponding author: Manuel J. Steinbauer

Globally accelerating trends in societal development and human environmental impacts since the mid-twentieth century (20世纪中叶) are known as the Great Acceleration and have been discussed as a key indicator of the onset of the Anthropocene epoch (人类世). While reports on ecological responses (for example, changes in species range or local extinctions) to the Great Acceleration are multiplying (倍增), it is unknown whether such biotic responses are undergoing a similar acceleration over time. This knowledge gap stems from (源于) the limited availability of time series data on biodiversity changes across large temporal and geographical extents. Here we use a dataset of repeated plant surveys from 302 mountain summits (山峰) across Europe, spanning 145 years of observation, to assess the temporal trajectory of mountain biodiversity changes as a globally coherent (清楚明白的) imprint (特征) of the Anthropocene. We find a continent-wide acceleration in the rate of increase in plant species richness, with five times as much species enrichment between 2007 and 2016 as fifty years ago, between 1957 and 1966. This acceleration is strikingly synchronized (同步) with accelerated global warming and is not linked to alternative global change drivers. The accelerating increases in species richness on mountain summits across this broad spatial extent demonstrate that acceleration in climate-induced biotic change is occurring even in remote places (偏僻地区) on Earth, with potentially far-ranging consequences not only for biodiversity, but also for ecosystem functioning and services.

20世纪中叶全球的社会发展和人类对于环境的影响均处在极大的加速当中，这已经被作为人类世开始的一个关键标志。有报道指出生态环境对大加速时期的响应在倍增，比如物种区域性灭绝等，而这些生物响应是否随着时间也会经历一个类似的加速还不清楚。人们对着这方面知识的空白源自于对于大范围的时间和地理上生物多样性连续时间序列数据的难以获取。本文利用欧洲大陆上302个山峰横跨145年的重复植物调查数据评估山峰多样性变化的时间轨迹，这可以作为人类世的一个明显特征。作者发现植物物种丰富度在整个大陆上存在加速，2007年到2016年的物种丰度加速要比50年前高出5倍。同时，这个加速与全球加速变暖显著同步，当与可能的全球变化驱动因素不关联。这种在广阔空间范围上山峰物种丰度增加的加速揭示了气候诱导的生物变化加速即使在地球上的偏远地区也在发生着，不仅对于生物多样性存在潜在的深远影响，同样对于生态系统的功能和服务也会产生深远影响。

通讯：Manuel J. Steinbauer (https://www.gzn.nat.fau.de/palaeontologie/team/professors/steinbauer/)

研究方向：全球生物多样性的产生和维持。

doi: 10.1038/s41586-018-0005-6

Journal: Nature

Published online: 04 April, 2018

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