Metacommunity robustness to invasion in mutualistic and antagonistic networks

Components of phylogenetic signal in antagonistic and mutualistic networks.

Recent studies have shown a phylogenetic signal in the structure of ecological networks, making the point that evolutionary history is important in explaining network architecture. However, this previous work has focused on either antagonistic (i.e., predator-prey) or mutualistic networks and has used different methodologies. Thus, a comparative assessment of both the frequency and the strength...

Correction to 'Unravelling Darwin's entangled bank: architecture and robustness of mutualistic networks with multiple interaction types'.

Nestedness in mutualistic networks

James et al. presented simulations that apparently falsify the analytical result by Bastolla et al., who showed that nested mutualistic interactions decrease interspecific competition and increase biodiversity in model ecosystems. This contradiction, however, mainly stems from the incorrect application of formulas derived for fully connected networks to empirical, sparse networks. Bastolla et a...

Why nestedness in mutualistic networks?

We investigate the relationship between the nested organization of mutualistic systems and their robustness against the extinction of species. We establish that a nested pattern of contacts is the best possible one as far as robustness is concerned, but only when the least linked species have the greater probability of becoming extinct. We introduce a coefficient that provides a quantitative me...

Ranking species in mutualistic networks

Understanding the architectural subtleties of ecological networks, believed to confer them enhanced stability and robustness, is a subject of outmost relevance. Mutualistic interactions have been profusely studied and their corresponding bipartite networks, such as plant-pollinator networks, have been reported to exhibit a characteristic "nested" structure. Assessing the importance of any given...