RT Journal Article
T1 Increasing the number of stressors reduces soil ecosystem services worldwide
A1 Rillig, Matthias C.
A1 van der Heijden, Marcel G. A.
A1 Berdugo Vega, Miguel
A1 Liu, Yu-Rong
A1 Riedo, Judith
A1 Sanz-Lazaro, Carlos
A1 Moreno-Jiménez, Eduardo
A1 Romero, Ferran
A1 Tedersoo, Leho
A1 Delgado-Baquerizo, Manuel
AB Increasing the number of environmental stressors could decrease ecosystem functioning in soils. Yet this relationship has not been globally assessed outside laboratory experiments. Here, using two independent global standardized field surveys, and a range of natural and human factors, we test the relationship between the number of environmental stressors exceeding different critical thresholds and the maintenance of multiple ecosystem services across biomes. Our analysis shows that having multiple stressors, from medium levels (>50%), negatively and significantly correlates with impacts on ecosystem services and that having multiple stressors crossing a high-level critical threshold (over 75% of maximum observed levels) reduces soil biodiversity and functioning globally. The number of environmental stressors exceeding the >75% threshold was consistently seen as an important predictor of multiple ecosystem services, therefore improving prediction of ecosystem functioning. Our findings highlight the need to reduce the dimensionality of the human footprint on ecosystems to conserve biodiversity and function.
PB Springer Nature
SN 1758-6798
YR 2023
FD 2023-03-16
LK https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/122750
UL https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/122750
LA eng
NO Rillig, M. C., van der Heijden, M. G. A., Berdugo, M., Liu, Y.-R., Riedo, J., Sanz-Lazaro, C., Moreno-Jiménez, E., Romero, F., Tedersoo, L., & Delgado-Baquerizo, M. (2023). Increasing the number of stressors reduces soil ecosystem services worldwide. Nature Climate Change, 13(5), 478–483. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-023-01627-2
NO Funding: This project received funding from the British Ecological Society (agreement no. LRA17\1193; MUSGONET). M.D.-B. acknowledges support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation for the I+D+i project PID2020-115813RA-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033. M.D.-B. is also supported by a project of the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) and the Consejería de Transformación Económica, Industria, Conocimiento y Universidades of the Junta de Andalucía (FEDER Andalucía 2014–2020 Objetivo temático ‘01 - Refuerzo de la investigación, el desarrollo tecnológico y la innovación’) associated with the research project P20_00879 (ANDABIOMA). E.M.-J. thanks the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for supporting his research stay in Germany (Fellowship for Experienced Researchers). M.C.R. acknowledges support from an ERC Advanced Grant (694368). M.G.A.H. acknowledges funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation (grant 310030_188799). M.B. is supported by Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through a Ramón y Cajal Fellowship (# RYC2021-031797-I).
NO British Ecological Society
NO Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (España)
NO Agencia Estatal de Investigación (España)
NO Junta de Andalucía
NO Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
NO European Research Council (ERC)
NO Swiss National Science Foundation
DS Docta Complutense
RD 8 jun 2026