Threats to soil biodiversity

Question 1

What can species loss result in?

Answer 1

Reduction in ecosystem productivity

Question 2

What did a 1999 study conclude about species richness in soil?

Answer 2

Increased species richness in soil results in increased above ground biomass

Question 3

Why is there a lack of data on species loss in soil?

Answer 3

Most studies focus on above ground organisms

Question 4

How are soils characterised?

Answer 4

By their physical and chemical properties

Question 5

Out of 909 soil families in China have been impacted by cultivation and construction?

Answer 5

359

Question 6

A large proportion of European soils are under high levels of threat, in what areas is this worst?

Answer 6

Highly urbanised and populated areas

Question 7

Give two examples of threats with high risk potential

Answer 7

Intensive human exploitation and organic matter decline

Question 8

Give three examples of threats with moderate risk potential

Answer 8

Soil sealing, industrial pollution, and land use change

Question 9

Give two examples of threats with low risk potential

Answer 9

Habitat fragmentation and use of GMO

Question 10

Give an example of evidence that soil biodiversity is sensitive to human disturbances

Answer 10

Soil biodiversity decreases in tropical forests when converted for agriculture

Question 11

In what ways does soil biodiversity change when land is repurposed for intensive agriculture, as found by a 2015 study?

Answer 11

Less diverse and trophically complex

Question 12

What are the three hypotheses of the biodiversity-function theory?

Answer 12

Redundancy, linear, idiosyncratic

Question 13

Describe the redundancy hypothesis in the biodiversity-function theory

Answer 13

High level of functional redundancy within communities (niche overlap). If one species is extinct, another will take its role. Tropic groups are maintained and the food web is intact.

Question 14

Describe the linear hypothesis in the biodiversity-function theory

Answer 14

All species have a role and a loss of a species would cause a linear decline in function. There is a threshold where the system would collapse.

Question 15

Describe the idiosyncratic hypothesis in the biodiversity-function theory

Answer 15

High level of functional redundancy but some are more redundant than others. Depends on some species having a more important role than others.

Question 16

What did Jones et al (1994) conclude that the two types of organisms in ecosystem processes were?

Answer 16

Keystone species (alter system by tropic relations) and engineer species (alter system by physical disturbances)

Question 17

Describe the insurance hypothesis, as described by Jones et al (1994)

Answer 17

Diverse communities are more likely to contain species that can withstand a changing environment, buffering the system against the loss of the species that cannot

Question 18

What was the 1991 study in boreal forests about?

Answer 18

Decomposition rate of an organic substrate as a result of species biodiversity of a soil fungi

Question 19

Which hypothesis did the 1991 boreal forest study support?

Answer 19

Supported the redundancy hypothesis

Question 20

What did a 2014 and a 2021 study conclude about soil biodiversity and ecosystem multifunctionality?

Answer 20

Greater bacterial and fungal richness supported higher stability of the aboveground ecosystems (productivity and diversity) and the stability of litter decomposition and carbon assimilation

Question 21

Why was a 2016 study into microbial biodiversity and multifunctional stability more applicable that the 2014 and 2021 studies?

Answer 21

Was carried out in the field