The research was published in the journal of the US National Academy of Sciences.
Environmental fluctuations, variations that occur naturally in temperature, light, etc. throughout the day-night or with the seasons, are decisive in predicting more accurately the nature and magnitude of the effects of global change on different organisms and ecosystems. This is demonstrated in a study carried out by scientists from the University of Vigo’s Marine Research Centre, Marco Jabalera, a researcher contracted through the Juan de la Cierva programme, and the Professor of Ecology Emilio Marañón, whose results were recently published in the journal of the US National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
The results of this research, carried out within the Biological Oceanography group, highlight the need to consider environmental fluctuations in experimental and modelling studies, as well as in all management and conservation actions.
To assess whether environmental fluctuations can alter the predicted effects of the different variables associated with global change, the authors of the study reviewed the scientific literature published on this topic over the last three decades. This allowed them to identify five main environmental factors that could affect: quenching, acidification, changes in oxygen concentration (hypo- and hyperoxia), resource supply and light. Five factors that they studied on different groups of animals, bacteria, fungi, plants and protists.
The authors found that the frequency of additive effects (“the effect of a given factor is not modified by the effect of a second factor”) was higher than that of interactive effects (“the effect of one factor is exacerbated or attenuated by the effect of another factor, so that the combined effect of both is greater or less than the sum of the individual effects”). According to the researchers, this contradicts the traditional view in ecology that multiple factors associated with global change tend to exert interactive effects on organisms and ecosystems. “Moreover, the results also show that the dominant type of interaction can vary depending on the trophic level and the group of organisms considered,” emphasise Jabalera and Marañón.
The research activity of the CIM is supported by the Xunta de Galicia and the European Union, through its co-financing under the Galicia ERDF Operational Programme 2014-2020.
Read the full article in the DUVI.