Generalized Models Reveal Stabilizing Factors in Food Webs

Abstract

Untangling Food Webs The factors affecting the stability of food webs are important in conservation and ecological restoration. Gross et al. (p. 747 ) used a generalized modeling approach to evaluate billions of replicates of food webs in order to reveal the properties that stabilize (or destabilize) food webs. Variability in the strength of trophic links between predator and prey strength affected stability in different ways depending on the size of the web—stabilizing only in relatively small food webs and destabilizing in larger ones. Universal topological rules were extracted for the patterns of network links that enhance food-web stability.