A research group led by Professor Michio Kondo of Ryukoku University, Researcher Masayuki Ushio, and Associate Professor Reiji Masuda of Kyoto University analyzed biological population fluctuation data over the past 12 years in Maizuru Bay using a new mathematical data analysis method. , I succeeded in capturing how the relationship between species fluctuates with time.This achievement was published in the British scientific journal "Nature" on Thursday, February 2018, 2.
Various types of organisms live together in the ecosystem, but the "extinction" phenomenon in which the number of individuals becomes zero and the "outbreak" phenomenon in which only a specific species increases rapidly occur frequently. It does not occur and has stability that falls within a certain range.Elucidation of such a mechanism is an important issue in ecology, but it has been extremely difficult to understand interspecific interactions that cannot be observed directly with the naked eye.
Therefore, the research group focused on 14 species of fish and 1 species of jellyfish in Maizuru Bay, and newly developed population fluctuation data for the past 15 years, in which these 2 species of organisms were observed once every two weeks. We succeeded in detecting the interaction between species by analyzing with the mathematical method.
This analysis has succeeded in capturing complex interactions between species in the field "as is" from population variation data alone.In addition, the number of species inhabiting Maizuru Bay increases in the summer and individual interspecies interactions weaken, resulting in a seasonal cycle in which community stability is high in the summer and low in the winter. Do you get it.
In addition, by using this method, it is possible to detect interactions that work between species in other ecosystems.
Paper information:[Nature] Fluctuating interaction network and time-varying stability of a natural fish community
