ArticleNature communications2020
The megabiota are disproportionately important for biosphere functioning.
Article in Nature communications, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 50 papers.
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Who cites it
50 citing papers in PubMed.
- Widespread declines of formerly common species reshape local assemblages over time.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Degradation of fish food webs in the Anthropocene.Science advances · 2026Article
- A dataset of radiocarbon dates from Holarctic mammal collagen purified with high-quality chemistry.Scientific data · 2026Article
- Mapping the density of giant trees in the Amazon.The New phytologist · 2026Article
- Sodium constraints on megaherbivore communities in Africa.Nature ecology & evolution · 2026Article
- Endozoochory by Black Rhinoceroses Enhances Germination of a Key Arid Savanna Tree Species.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Biomass distribution of sympatric mammals in a European temperate forest.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- Sodium Retention in Large Herbivores: Physiological Insights and Zoogeochemical Consequences.Journal of experimental zoology. Part A, Ecological and integrative physiology · 2025Article
- What moves large grazers? Habitat preferences and complementing niches of large herbivores in a Danish trophic rewilding area.Environmental management · 2025Article
- Human land use and non-native fish species erode ecosystem services by changing community size structure.Nature ecology & evolution · 2025Article
- Complex Variation in Afrotropical Mammal Communities With Human Impact.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- The need for carbon finance schemes to tackle overexploitation of tropical forest wildlife.Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology · 2025Article
- The trophic distribution of biomass in ecosystems with co-occurring wildlife and livestock.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Reconstructing the degree of mammal defaunation throughout the Caatinga - the largest dry tropical forest region of South America.PloS one · 2025Article
- Reference genome of the leopard seal (Frontiers in genetics · 2025Article
- Article
- Survey-based inference of continental African elephant decline.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Food chain without giants: modelling the trophic impact of bowhead whaling on little auk populations in the Atlantic Arctic.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Stretched sapwood, ultra-widening permeability and ditching da Vinci: revising models of plant form and function.Annals of botany · 2024Article
- Future changes in society and climate may strongly shape wild large-herbivore faunas across Europe.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
A prominent signal of the Anthropocene is the extinction and population reduction of the megabiota-the largest animals and plants on the planet. However, we lack a predictive framework for the sensitivity of megabiota during times of rapid global change and how they impact the functioning of ecosystems and the biosphere. Here, we extend metabolic scaling theory and use global simulation models to demonstrate that (i) megabiota are more prone to extinction due to human land use, hunting, and climate change; (ii) loss of megabiota has a negative impact on ecosystem metabolism and functioning; and (iii) their reduction has and will continue to significantly decrease biosphere functioning. Global simulations show that continued loss of large animals alone could lead to a 44%, 18% and 92% reduction in terrestrial heterotrophic biomass, metabolism, and fertility respectively. Our findings suggest that policies that emphasize the promotion of large trees and animals will have disproportionate impact on biodiversity, ecosystem processes, and climate mitigation.
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