ReviewEcology and evolution2019
Microbial functional diversity: From concepts to applications.
Review in Ecology and evolution, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 84 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
84 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Pooled it
- DURABLE: A Workflow for Determining Corrosion-Driving and Protective Microbial Mechanisms.Environmental science & technology · 2026Article
- Hidden Microbiota Inhabiting in Pollen Reserves of Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) From Amazonas Region Revealed by DNA Metabarcoding.Environmental microbiology reports · 2026Article
- Linking stochastic assembly to functional potential, redundancy, and trait patterns in bacterial communities.Microbiome · 2026Article
- Exploring the power of microbes: the mud-battery project for high school students.Journal of microbiology & biology education · 2026Article
- Seed-microbiome interactions: Mechanistic insights and utilization toward seed performance for sustainable agriculture.Plant communications · 2026Review
- The assembly of microbial communities on red sandstone surfaces was shaped by dispersal limitation and heterogeneous selection.mSystems · 2026Article
- A microbiologist's field guide to community ecology.ISME communications · 2026Review
- Gut Morphological Structure-Microbial Characteristics inAnimals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- Resource diversity and supply drive colonization resistance.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- Global Review of Blue Carbon Ecosystem Microbial Communities.Environmental microbiology · 2025Review
- Community Composition and Diversity of β-Glucosidase Genes in Soils by Amplicon Sequence Variant Analysis.Genes · 2025Article
- Leveraging core enzyme structures for microbiota targeted functional regulation: Urease as an example.iMeta · 2025Article
- Insights from a Long-Term Outdoor Mesocosm Study: eDNA Metabarcoding Reveals Exacerbated but Transient Impacts from a Nanoenabled Pesticide Formulation (Nano-TiOACS ES&T water · 2025Article
- Comparative analysis of esophageal gland microbes between two body sizes ofMicrobiology spectrum · 2025Article
- The Role of Phenotypic Plasticity and Within-Environment Trait Variability in the Assembly of the Nectar Microbiome and Plant-Microbe-Animal Interactions.Ecology and evolution · 2025Review
- Microbial functional diversity and redundancy: moving forward.FEMS microbiology reviews · 2025Review
- CODARFE: Unlocking the prediction of continuous environmental variables based on microbiome.GigaScience · 2025Article
- Impacts of plant root traits and microbial functional attributes on soil respiration components in the desert-oasis ecotone.Frontiers in plant science · 2025Article
- Microbial communities and their association with soil health indicators under row cash crop and cover crop diversification: a case study.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
24 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Functional diversity is increasingly recognized by microbial ecologists as the essential link between biodiversity patterns and ecosystem functioning, determining the trophic relationships and interactions between microorganisms, their participation in biogeochemical cycles, and their responses to environmental changes. Consequently, its definition and quantification have practical and theoretical implications. In this opinion paper, we present a synthesis on the concept of microbial functional diversity from its definition to its application. Initially, we revisit to the original definition of functional diversity, highlighting two fundamental aspects, the ecological unit under study and the functional traits used to characterize it. Then, we discuss how the particularities of the microbial world disallow the direct application of the concepts and tools developed for macroorganisms. Next, we provide a synthesis of the literature on the types of ecological units and functional traits available in microbial functional ecology. We also provide a list of more than 400 traits covering a wide array of environmentally relevant functions. Lastly, we provide examples of the use of functional diversity in microbial systems based on the different units and traits discussed herein. It is our hope that this paper will stimulate discussions and help the growing field of microbial functional ecology to realize a potential that thus far has only been attained in macrobial ecology.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.