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Ecological complexity of species interactions and habitat heterogeneity creates and maintains biodiversity at a trophic level in an ecosystem. This biodiversity simultaneously serves as raw material on which selective forces for organizing ecosystems operate. As a result of this organization process, differences in structure and functioning of ecosystems (diversity at ecosystem level) are generated. Although understanding diversity at the ecosystem level has attracted great interest, recent theoretical advances toward this aim have not been fully appreciated yet. Following Higashi et al. (1993), this report presents a theoretical framework that deals with the organization process of an ecosystem as a consequence of the interactions among its biotic components and their modification of ecological traits. Specifically, the ecosystem organization process of a terrestrial ecosystem is analyzed, including primary producers and decomposers. This model sheds new insight into the differences between temperate and tropical forest ecosystems. |
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