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Ecosystem tipping points in an evolving world

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 3, pages 355–362 (2019)Cite this article

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Abstract

There is growing concern over tipping points arising in ecosystems because of the crossing of environmental thresholds. Tipping points lead to abrupt and possibly irreversible shifts between alternative ecosystem states, potentially incurring high societal costs. Trait variation in populations is central to the biotic feedbacks that maintain alternative ecosystem states, as they govern the responses of populations to environmental change that could stabilize or destabilize ecosystem states. However, we know little about how evolutionary changes in trait distributions over time affect the occurrence of tipping points and even less about how big-scale ecological shifts reciprocally interact with trait dynamics. We argue that interactions between ecological and evolutionary processes should be taken into account in order to understand the balance of feedbacks governing tipping points in nature.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank C. Clements and G. Baruah for their helpful comments. V.D. and B.M. are grateful to Eawag and the Adaptation to a Changing Environment Program at ETH Zurich for financing a workshop on eco-evolutionary dynamics of tipping points held in Kastanienbaum in 2016. B.M. acknowledges a SNF 31003A_175614 grant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute des Sciences de l’Évolution, Université de Montpellier, CNRS, IRD, EPHE, Montpellier, France

    Vasilis Dakos

  2. Eawag, Department of Aquatic Ecology, Center for Ecology, Evolution and Biogeochemistry, Kastanienbaum, Switzerland

    Blake Matthews

  3. Redpath Museum & Dept. of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

    Andrew P. Hendry

  4. Institute of Integrative Biology, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Jonathan Levine

  5. Sorbonne Université, UPMC Univ Paris 06, CNRS, IRD, INRA, Université Paris Diderot, Institute of Ecology and Environmental Sciences (UMR7618), Paris, France

    Nicolas Loeuille

  6. Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Jon Norberg

  7. Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK

    Patrik Nosil

  8. Department of Environmental Sciences, Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, the Netherlands

    Marten Scheffer

  9. Laboratory of Aquatic Ecology, Evolution and Conservation, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Luc De Meester

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V.D. and B.M. designed the research and wrote the paper, with contributions from all authors.

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Dakos, V., Matthews, B., Hendry, A.P. et al. Ecosystem tipping points in an evolving world. Nat Ecol Evol 3, 355–362 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-0797-2

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