Biodiversity loss ranks with climate change and pollution in terms of impacts to environment

A recent study published by an international research team working at UC Santa Barbara's National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) has found that loss of biodiversity impacts the environment as significantly as climate change and pollution. The study, titled, "A global synthesis reveals biodiversity loss as a major driver of ecosystem change," was published May 2 in the journal Nature.

"For the past 15 years, ecologists have built a rich understanding of the consequences of humans driving species extinct. What we didn't know before this paper is whether those impacts of species loss rank up there with those from the major drivers of environmental change," said Jarrett Byrnes, a postdoctoral fellow with NCEAS.

Led by Western Washington University biologist David Hooper, the scientists, including those from institutions in the U.S., Canada, and Sweden, examined the effects of various environmental stressors on plant growth and decomposition, two crucial processes in any ecosystem. With data synthesized from almost 200 published studies, they measured the rate of species loss in different ecosystems, and found that the greater the plant species loss, the higher the negative impact on plant growth. The effects of biodiversity loss on biomass were similar to the effects from other environmental stressors, including global warming and pollution.

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http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-05/uoc--blr050912.php