RT info:eu-repo/semantics/article T1 Jack-of-all-trades effects drive biodiversity-ecosystem multifunctionality relationships in European forests A1 Van Der Plas , F A1 Zavala Gironés, Miguel Ángel de K1 Biodiversity K1 Forest ecology K1 Medio Ambiente K1 Environmental science AB There is considerable evidence that biodiversity promotes multiple ecosystem functions (multifunctionality),thus ensuring the delivery of ecosystem services important for human well-being.However, the mechanisms underlying this relationship are poorly understood, especially in naturalecosystems. We develop a novel approach to partition biodiversity effects on multifunctionality intothree mechanisms and apply this to European forest data. We show that throughout Europe, treediversity is positively related with multifunctionality when moderate levels of functioning are required,but negatively when very high function levels are desired. For two well-known mechanisms, 'complementarity'and 'selection', we detect only minor effects on multifunctionality. Instead a third, so faroverlooked mechanism, the 'jack-of-all-trades' effect, caused by the averaging of individual specieseffects on function, drives observed patterns. Simulations demonstrate that jack-of-all-trades effectsoccur whenever species effects on different functions are not perfectly correlated, meaning they maycontribute to diversity&-multifunctionality relationships in many of the world's ecosystems. SN 2041-1723 YR 2016 FD 2016 LK http://hdl.handle.net/10017/37620 UL http://hdl.handle.net/10017/37620 LA eng NO European Union Seventh Framework Programme DS MINDS@UW RD 29-mar-2024