Differences between juveniles and adults determine resilience of complex ecological communities

A new study shows that differences between juvenile and adult individuals are crucial for the stability of complex ecological communities. These findings, now published in the scientific journal Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences by Prof. André de Roos from the University of Amsterdam, provides important information about the dynamics and functioning of diverse ecological communities. Biodiversity is declining and species are rapidly going extinct, raising concerns that the dwindling number of species may cause entire ecological communities to collapse. But whether or not ecological communities that include more species are indeed more resilient and better to withstand natural and human-induced disturbances is a question that has been hotly debated for more than 50 years without reaching a conclusive answer. The new study by Prof. André de Roos from the UvA Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics may well provide a resolution to the debate. The study accounts for two different axes of complexity and reveals how their interplay crucially determines the dynamics and functioning of complex systems. Species networks.