Related papers: Is nestedness in mutualistic networks an evolution…
Nested structure, which is non-random, controls cooperation dynamics and biodiversity in plant-animal mutualistic networks. This structural pattern has been explained in a static (non-growth) network models. However, evolutionary processes…
Mutualistic networks are formed when the interactions between two classes of species are mutually beneficial. They are important examples of cooperation shaped by evolution. Mutualism between animals and plants plays a key role in the…
Mutualistic interactions, which are beneficial for both interacting species, are recurrently present in ecosystems. Observations of natural systems showed that, if we draw mutualistic relationships as binary links between species, the…
Understanding the architectural subtleties of ecological networks, believed to confer them enhanced stability and robustness, is a subject of outmost relevance. Mutualistic interactions have been profusely studied and their corresponding…
Previous work has shown that species interacting in an ecosystem and actors transacting in an economic context may have notable similarities in behavior. However, the specific mechanism that may underlie similarities in nature and human…
We investigate the relationship between the nested organization of mutualistic systems and their robustness against the extinction of species. We establish that a nested pattern of contacts is the best possible one as far as robustness is…
The architecture of bipartite networks linking two classes of constituents is affected by the interactions within each class. For the bipartite networks representing the mutualistic relationship between pollinating animals and plants, it…
We investigate how the pattern of contacts between species in mutualistic ecosystems is affected by the phylogenetic proximity between the species of each guild. We develop a dynamical model geared to establish the role of such proximity in…
We investigate how the pattern of contacts between species in mutualistic ecosystems is affected by the phylogenetic proximity between the species of each guild. We develop several theoretical tools to measure that effect and we use them to…
We consider the concept of mutual information in ecological networks, and use this idea to analyse the Tangled Nature model of co-evolution. We show that this measure of correlation has two distinct behaviours depending on how we define the…
Evolutionary relationships between species are usually represented in phylogenies, i.e. evolutionary trees, which are a type of networks. The terminal nodes of these trees represent species, which are made of individuals and populations…
Mutualistic interactions are vital constituents of ecological and socio-economic systems. Empirical studies have found that the patterns of reciprocal relations among the participants often shows the salient features of being simultaneously…
Uncovering structural properties of ecological networks is a crucial starting point of studying the system's stability in response to various types of perturbations. We analyze pollination and seed disposal networks, which are…
Plant-pollinator mutualistic networks are asymmetric in their interactions: specialist plants are pollinated by generalist animals, while generalist plants are pollinated by a broad involving specialists and generalists. It has been…
The observed architecture of ecological and socio-economic networks differs significantly from that of random networks. From a network science standpoint, non-random structural patterns observed in real networks call for an explanation of…
Ecological systems have a high level of complexity combined with stability and rich biodiversity. Recently, the analysis of their properties and evolution has been pushed forward on a basis of concept of mutualistic networks that provides a…
The discourse surrounding the structural organization of mutualistic interactions mostly revolves around modularity and nestedness. The former is known to enhance the stability of communities, while the latter is related to their…
Ecology and evolution are inseparable. Motivated by some recent experiments, we have developed models of evolutionary ecology from the perspective of dynamic networks. In these models, in addition to the intra-node dynamics, which…
Relations among species in ecosystems can be represented by complex networks where both negative (competition) and positive (mutualism) interactions are concurrently present. Recently, it has been shown that many ecosystems can be cast into…
The robustness of an ecological network quantifies the resilience of the ecosystem it represents to species loss. It corresponds to the proportion of species that are disconnected from the rest of the network when extinctions occur…