Journal
FRONTIERS IN MICROBIOLOGY
Volume 9, Issue -, Pages -Publisher
FRONTIERS MEDIA SA
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2018.00734
Keywords
stability; microbial ecosystem service; simulation model; ecological modeling; fragmentation; resilience; biomass distribution; bacterial degradation
Categories
Funding
- Helmholtz Association
- German Federal Ministry of Education and Research [FKZ 031A317]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Bacterial degradation of organic compounds is an important ecosystem function with relevance to, e.g., the cycling of elements or the degradation of organic contaminants. It remains an open question, however, to which extent ecosystems are able to maintain such biodegradation function under recurrent disturbances (functional resistance) and how this is related to the bacterial biomass abundance. In this paper, we use a numerical simulation approach to systematically analyze the dynamic response of a microbial population to recurrent disturbances of different spatial distribution. The spatially explicit model considers microbial degradation, growth, dispersal, and spatial networks that facilitate bacterial dispersal mimicking effects of mycelial networks in nature. We find: (i) There is a certain capacity for high resistance of biodegradation performance to recurrent disturbances. (ii) If this resistance capacity is exceeded, spatial zones of different biodegradation performance develop, ranging from no or reduced to even increased performance. (iii) Bacterial biomass and biodegradation dynamics respond inversely to the spatial fragmentation of disturbances: overall biodegradation performance improves with increasing fragmentation, but bacterial biomass declines. (iv) Bacterial dispersal networks can enhance functional resistance against recurrent disturbances, mainly by reactivating zones in the core of disturbed areas, even though this leads to an overall reduction of bacterial biomass.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available