In many ways hubbells theory is the ecological analog to the neutral theory of genetic drift in genetics. Predicting the future of the web development 2020 and 2025 duration. Aug 22, 2016 as the authors discuss, the neutral theory set forth by stephen hubbell, suggests that communities are random assortments drawn from regional pools of microbes. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography by. Mar 15, 2005 much has been written about the unified neutral theory unt since my book appeared hubbell 2001, some of it critical, and there have been several major technical and conceptual advances in the theory since then e. Pdf sampling hubbells neutral theory of biodiversity. Wilson, author of biodiversity this book should be a true landmark, a revolutionary and compelling treatment that can do for community ecology what neutrality theory did for molecular and.
The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32. Hubbells theory is based on neutral models of community drift. Stephen hubbell, or the paramount power of randomness. Despite its supreme importance and the threat of its global crash, biodiversity remains poorly understood both empirically and theoretically. Simulating local community dynamics under ecological drift. I define biodiversity to be synony mous with species richness and relative. Before this book the nicheassembly framework was dominating the study of community dynamics. Project muse the unified neutral theory of biodiversity.
This is unlike what is proposed in the traditional niche theory, that states microbes inhabit specific niches linked to the role that they play as a species. In this book, stephen hubbell develops a formal mathematical theory that unifies these two fields. Stephen hubbell and the elaboration of the neutral theory. This ambitious book presents a new, general neutral theory to explain the origin, maintenance. From controlled environments of a data center to the demanding continuity of the power. Hubbell developed his theory analogous to the neutral theory of molecular evolution kimura 1983 with individuals, species, speciation and ecological drift replacing genes, alleles, mutation and. Ecologists are largely agreed that neutral theory has provided valuable null models for community ecology, particularly for speciesrich systems bell 2001. This ambitious book presents a new, general neutral theory to explain the origin, maintenance, and loss of biodiversity in a biogeographic context. Keywords abundance distributions, hubbell s neutral theory, poissonian zerosum multinomial, sampling theory. Hubbell argues that the number of species in a community is controlled by species extinction and immigration or speciation of new species. Hubbell answers with a mathematical formula, which he described in a book last year titled, the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. Hubbell department of plant biology, university of georgia, athens, ga 30605, and smithsonian tropical research institute, box. Stephen hubbell is the father of the neutral theory in ecology, which has already stimulated lots of empirical research and theoretical controversy among ecologists since the publication of his masterwork, the unified theory of biodiversity and biogeography in 2001. The hypothesis aims to explain the diversity and relative abundance of species in ecological communities, although like other neutral theories of ecology, hubbells hypothesis assumes.
Because community assembly is partly based on immigration, hubbell s theory is conceptually linked to macarthur and wilsons 1967 theory of island biogeography. Assuming that all individuals of all species in a trophically similar community are ecologically equivalent. Hubbell department of plant biology, university of georgia, athens, georgia 30605 usa, and smithsonian tropical research institute, box 2072, balboa, panama. The case for ecological neutral theory sciencedirect. Ecological neutral theory has elicited strong opinions in recent years. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. Granted, hubbell started his career in the late 70s. Hubbell s neutral theory of biodiversity has challenged the classic nichebased view of ecological community structure. For neutral theory, the classic book is hubbell 2001, in which the neutral theory is formally developed, although the book chapter hubbell and foster 1986 is an easytoread overview of the theory in its early days, before it was mathematically formalized. Niche versus neutral models of community organization.
Hubbell department of plant biology, university of georgia, athens, ga 30605, and smithsonian tropical research institute, box 2072, balboa, panama introduction. The important role of theory in conservation biology. Department of plant biology, university of georgia, athens, georgia 30605 usa, and smithsonian tropical research institute, box 2072, balboa, panama. We use neutral theory to refer to an ensemble of different neutral models by various authors, that retains the spirit of what most think of as neutral theory without having too narrow a scope. Burndy is committed to providing the latest in online tools to help customers and distributors get the information they are looking for when the need it. Hubbell s theory is modeled on neutral theory in population genetics, where within a species, each individuals prospects of death and reproduction are independent of its genotype kimura, 1983. He is author of the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography untb, which seeks to explain the diversity and relative abundance of species in ecological communities. Neutral theory in community ecology and the hypothesis of. The theory aims to explain the diversity and relative abundance. Tropical forest community ecology annals of botany oxford.
A test of the unified neutral theory of biodiversity nature. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography book. The mainland community is regulated by evolutionary processes speciation and extinction and provides immigrants to the island. Hubbell neutral theory in community ecology and the hypothesis of functional equivalence stephen p. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32 ebook written by stephen p. The hypothesis aims to explain the diversity and relative abundance of species in ecological communities, although like other neutral theories of ecology, hubbell s hypothesis. Pdf the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. Chapter one macarthur and wilsons radical theory this is a book about a new general theory of biodiversity in a geographical context. Unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. May 09, 2017 the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography is a theory and the title of a monograph by ecologist stephen hubbell. In 2001 the book by stephen hubbell on the neutral theory of biodiversity was a major shift from classical community ecology.
Hubbell serves the needs of customers in a variety of market applications. There is much to be learned from such approaches, provided that they are continuously exposed both to empirical knowledge and to theoretical advances. In brief, hubbell proposed that patterns of species abundance in forest samples can be predicted from a model. Hubbell conceived this theory in close analogy with motoo kimuras neutral theory of evolution by genetic drift. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography kindle edition by stephen p. The unified neutral theory of biogeography and biodiversity should stimulate research in new theoretical and. The neutral theory presented in hubbells book shows some. Hubbell is also a senior staff scientist at the smithsonian tropical research.
Much has been written about the unified neutral theory unt since my book appeared hubbell 2001, some of it critical, and there have been several major technical and conceptual advances in the theory since then e. Wilsons now classical theory of island biogeography, the generalized theory predicts the existence of a universal, dimensionless biodiversity number. The hypothesis aims to explain the diversity and relative abundance of species in ecological communities, although like other neutral theories of ecology, hubbell s hypothesis assumes that the differences between members of an. Until now biogeography the study of the geographic distribution of species and biodiversity the study of species richness and relative species abundance have had largely disjunct intellectual histories. Hubbell s 1 neutral theory presented a null model for testing the mechanisms of species coexistence and biodiversity maintenance in ecological communities. The powerohm team is committed to providing the highest value, highest quality products at attractive prices. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. For example, hubbell s 2001 formulation of a neutral model has provided an expectation for the dynamics of a plant community lacking any niche structure, or speciesspecific. The first simplest scenario we considered was a neutral model of repertoire formation, similar to hubbell s neutral community model hubbell, 2001. Unified neutral theory of biodiversity sciencedaily. Jul 01, 2009 the second major advance, which stems from the first, is the development by steve hubbell of the neutral theory of biogeography and biodiversity hubbell, 2001 based on his work at the first ctfs plot at barro colorado island, panama. As the authors discuss, the neutral theory set forth by stephen hubbell, suggests that communities are random assortments drawn from regional pools of microbes. Chisholm, timedependent solutions of the spatially implicit neutral model of biodiversity, theoretical population biology, 80, 2, 71.
The measurements are indistinguishable from fictional distribution curves generated by models based on random processes. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography here unified theory or untb is a hypothesis and the title of a monograph by ecologist stephen hubbell. Hubbell s theory is based on neutral models of community drift. Neutral theory and community ecology chave 2004 ecology. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32 stephen p.
As an alternative to the niche theory, hubbell and other ecologists introduced a neutral model. The unified neutral theory of biogeography and biodiversity should stimulate research in new theoretical and empirical directions by ecologists, evolutionary biologists, and biogeographers. From controlled environments of a data center to the demanding continuity of the power grid. Hubbell s neutral theory of biodiversity is used to investigate the decline in species richness from the tropics to the poles.
On this basis, biodiversity should correlate with productivity or climate there is strong statistical evidence for this, with the latitudinal width of the continents insufficiently investigated as yet, and with the speciation rate which may not vary in such a way. Sampling hubbells neutral theory of biodiversity alonso. Very briefly under this framework local species composition is the result of the resource available at a particular site and species. Although there have been many attempts to falsify hubbell s theory, we argue that falsification should not lead to rejection, because there is more to the theory than neutrality alone. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32 stephen p hubbell despite its supreme importance and the threat of its global crash, biodiversity remains poorly understood both empirically and theoretically. Apr, 2003 the unified neutral theory of biodiversity or untb, hereafter used to refer to either the theory or hubbell s 2001 book 1 predicts that species abundance distributions sads should follow the. Like darwins theory, the neutral theory in ecology appeared first as a book. This ambitious book presents a new, general neutral. It also offered a simple mechanistic explanation of the species abundance distributions sad, which has been extensively studied in community ecology since the 1940s, but still lacks a theoretical consensus for their. Download it once and read it on your kindle device, pc, phones or tablets. When a speciation process is incorporated into robert h.
Jun 27, 2011 the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32 ebook written by stephen p. Neutral theory highlights the importance of dispersal limitation, speciation and ecological drift in the natural world and provides quantitative null models for assessing the role of adaptation and natural selection. Although neutral, hubbell s theory is nevertheless able to generate many nonobvious, testable, and remarkably accurate quantitative predictions about biodiversity and biogeography. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. Only one of these relates to neutral theory and the importance of ecological drift, whereas the others involve the link between pattern and process, the tradeoff between simplicity and. In hubbell s 2001 book, the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography, he pointed to a surprising feature of some measurements of relative species abundance distributions rsas. Testing the neutral theory of biodiversity with human. As part of this commitment we provide services such as online ecatalog, interactive ecatalog, ecommerce functionalities, product documentation and much, much more. This is a book about a new general theory of biodiversity in a geographical. Hubbells neutral theory of biodiversity is a stochastic, individualbased, mainlandisland model sensu hanski, 1999 where all individuals of all species are demographically equivalent hubbell, 2001. There is much to be learned from such approaches, provided that they are continuously exposed both to empirical knowledge and to. Download for offline reading, highlight, bookmark or take notes while you read the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb32.
Hubbell despite its supreme importance and the threat of its global crash, biodiversity remains poorly understood both empirically and theoretically. Throughout the book, hubbell shows the fit of the neutral model to various sets of data, and he provides a chapter on generality and testing the theory. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography is a hypothesis and the title of a monograph by ecologist stephen hubbell. This is a book about a new general theory of biodiversity in a geographical context.
The case for ecological neutral theory luke harmon. The strategy behind neutral theory is to see how far one can get with the simplification of assuming ecological equivalence before introducing more complexity. Demographic analysis of hubbells neutral theory of. Because community assembly is partly based on immigration, hubbells theory is conceptually linked to macarthur and wilsons 1967 theory of island biogeography. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity or untb, hereafter used to refer to either the theory or hubbell s 2001 book 1 predicts that species abundance distributions sads should follow the. Dormann monographs in population biology 32 princeton university press, princeton, oxford 2001 isbn. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography is a theory and the title of a monograph by ecologist stephen hubbell. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography mpb. Radical theory this is a book about a new general theory of biodiversity. Graham bell of mcgill university also developed a neutral theory independently of hubbell. Apr 29, 2001 although neutral, hubbell s theory is nevertheless able to generate many nonobvious, testable, and remarkably accurate quantitative predictions about biodiversity and biogeography. In many ways hubbell s theory is the ecological analog to the neutral theory of genetic drift in genetics. For some, the term is used purely interchangeably with null model. Although neutral, hubbells theory is nevertheless able to generate many nonobvious, testable, and remarkably accurate quantitative predictions about biodiversity and biogeography.
Why do so many species live in tropical forests and coral. Aug 30, 2001 theory must build on an understanding of simple cases and limiting assumptions, and hubbell s deductions from neutral assumptions have provided a rigorous basis for future work. Hubbell s neutral theory builds on, and is intended to supplant, one of the fields most influential and enduring theoretical edifices, the theory of island biogeography, by robert macarthur and edward wilson. A decade has now passed since hubbell published the unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography.
464 604 106 1175 462 1390 1373 1192 555 451 934 130 431 921 557 834 1556 835 1455 502 1375 448 68 1132 988 1141 1329 364 927 221 548 72 1022 610 274 470 1108 789 993 1125 745 1313