Marine Phanerozoic biodiversity increased in presence of ecosystem engineers

Marine Phanerozoic biodiversity increased in presence of ecosystem engineers | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Marine Phanerozoic biodiversity increased in presence of ecosystem engineers Alison Cribb, Simon Darroch, William Gearty This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-5447601/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Under Review Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Phanerozoic marine biodiversity dynamics have been shaped by continuous environmental change and biotic interactions. Although ecosystem engineers – animals whose behaviours modify resource availability – have established impacts on modern community ecology and diversity, their impacts on ancient ecosystems over geologic time have remained quantitatively underexplored. Here, we investigate the impacts of reef-building and bioturbating marine ecosystem engineers on biodiversity at each stage of the Phanerozoic, including their ability to maintain biodiversity over mass extinctions, and identify extrinsic conditions that modulate their impacts. We analysed fossil communities with and without ecosystem engineers to calculate effect sizes, thereby quantifying effects of the presence of ecosystem engineers on Shannon’s Diversity (H) at each stage in the Phanerozoic. We show that ecosystem engineers are significantly associated with increased biodiversity during the majority of the Phanerozoic. We also show that, over the last ~250 million years, the effectiveness of modern-type reef-builders is more sensitive to climate-driven stress than for modern-style bioturbators. Finally, our results reveal that climate can modulate ecosystem engineer impacts, with both bioturbators and reef-builders exhibiting strongest effect sizes within an optimal moderate temperature range. These results underscore ecosystem engineers’ crucial role in contributing to fluctuating biodiversity dynamics over the Phanerozoic. Earth and environmental sciences/Ecology/Palaeoecology Biological sciences/Ecology/Palaeoecology Biological sciences/Evolution/Palaeontology Full Text Additional Declarations There is NO Competing Interest. Supplementary Files CribbetalEcosystemengineersSupplementaryMaterials.pdf Cite Share Download PDF Status: Under Review Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-5447601","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":379983020,"identity":"d6e32662-17b0-4781-8fc5-b1228d849245","order_by":0,"name":"Alison Cribb","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAA4klEQVRIie3RIQ7CMBiG4a+BFLNktjVwhRISBoqrDE8wmClSQgJmByDhEhwA0aVipgeAgBghGRaJpJsAxTaJ6CvbPmn/FHC5/jAK/4kXWCg68rtK5K/zNt9uk7ggngJUE8Ilka02EAoWNiRCWUKOo3nAH7f7M7rC3yrKd3UEOVuM97OBUCYHMyHlh1qi2PRwmVGWbDRwAuVZBZl8yDnNS9KrI+Ut7YKcMCyJKEjlwzSRSazsLLGdxRjt9c10Pa4cP12tspdazoNOesuiSHe7qU7OcQVB6/sbZV7Nr7hcLperSW/8h1MarkjzAAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8604-6100","institution":"University of Southampton","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Alison","middleName":"","lastName":"Cribb","suffix":""},{"id":379983021,"identity":"3b1a99a5-dd5b-416d-811b-4fe8fe474bd0","order_by":1,"name":"Simon Darroch","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"Senckenberg Museum of Natural History","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Simon","middleName":"","lastName":"Darroch","suffix":""},{"id":379983022,"identity":"460d8cb2-ea41-4d06-853e-a9bc4bd0bbcf","order_by":2,"name":"William Gearty","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"Syracuse University","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"William","middleName":"","lastName":"Gearty","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2024-11-13 14:06:11","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5447601/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5447601/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":73014977,"identity":"424c73a8-1e5c-49f7-8b8d-3b94dc654550","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-01-06 02:32:20","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":873106,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"CribbetalEcosystemengineersMaintext.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5447601/v1_covered_6a68afdf-b29d-4952-b03f-1b9dcccae327.pdf"},{"id":73014770,"identity":"fd4416ce-b624-4907-9e67-e6267b570f65","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-01-06 02:24:19","extension":"pdf","order_by":2,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":1080583,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"CribbetalEcosystemengineersSupplementaryMaterials.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5447601/v1/97e4f991b239b6b4a5a06235.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"There is \u003cb\u003eNO\u003c/b\u003e Competing Interest.","formattedTitle":"Marine Phanerozoic biodiversity increased in presence of ecosystem engineers","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":false,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"nature-portfolio","isNatureJournal":true,"hasQc":false,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"","title":"Nature Portfolio","twitterHandle":"","acdcEnabled":false,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"ejp","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":true,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":false},"keywords":"","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5447601/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5447601/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"Phanerozoic marine biodiversity dynamics have been shaped by continuous environmental change and biotic interactions. 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