Am. J. Bot. Join BSA Today!
HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced]


     

(American Journal of Botany. 2009;96:1430-1444.)
doi: 10.3732/ajb.0900063
© 2009 Botanical Society of America, Inc.
 		  Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Facebook   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter
What's this?
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when eLetters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Hammond, S. T.
Right arrow Articles by Niklas, K. J.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by Hammond, S. T.
Right arrow Articles by Niklas, K. J.
Agricola
Right arrow Articles by Hammond, S. T.
Right arrow Articles by Niklas, K. J.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Facebook   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Ecology

Emergent properties of plants competing in silico for space and light: Seeing the tree from the forest1

Sean T. Hammond and Karl J. Niklas2

Cornell University, Department of Plant Biology, Ithaca, New York 14850 USA

ABSTRACT

A spatially explicit, reiterative algorithm (SERA) is presented and used to predict multiple aspects of plant population and community dynamics. Using simple physical principles and empirically derived relationships, SERA provides an analytical venue to test alternative hypotheses about individual functional traits governing ecological or evolutionary processes at the population or community level of complexity. Our analyses show that, as a result of competition for light and space, individual-level features scale up to produce species ensemble properties such as the scaling of self-thinning, size-dependent mortality, realistic size–frequency distributions, and a broad spectrum of empirically observed relationships for the species examined. SERA also predicts the competitive exclusion of conifers by angiosperms and the age at which reproductive maturity is achieved by different species. SERA serves as a null hypothesis by demonstrating that biologically complex phenomena, including widely observed scaling relationships at the species-ensemble level, can emerge from the operation of simple and transparent "rules" governing competition for space and light.

Key Words: Abies alba • community-level effects • computer program • emergent properties • plant allometry • scaling relationships • self-organization • West, Brown, Enquist (WBE) theory

Received for publication 24 February 2009. Accepted for publication 21 May 2009.

FOOTNOTES

1 The authors thank M. L. Christianson, T. G. Owens, R. Rand, R. D. Holt, and two anonymous reviewers for suggestions that improved this paper. Funding and support from the Imaginary Bridges Group and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Cornell University, are gratefully acknowledged.

2 Author for correspondence (e-mail: kjn2{at}cornell.edu)


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Facebook Facebook   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?




HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Copyright © 2009 by the Botanical Society of America, Inc.