A super‐network approach to the complexity of nature: Crossing scale and habitat borders M. Sc. Thesis by Lea Kromann‐Gallop Institute of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Ny Munkegade 114, DK‐8000 Aarhus C, Denmark July 2011 For correspondence: e‐mail
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[email protected] TABLE OF CONTENT Report: 2 Title: A super-network approach to the complexity of nature: Crossing scale and habitat borders Abstract: 2 Keywords: 2 Introduction: 3 Material and Methods: 7 Results: 18 Discussion: 31 Conclusion: 42 Acknowledgements: 43 References: 43 Appendix 1: 47 Manuscript to article: Annex 1 Title: An ecological super-network: Structure, linkage, constraints and robustness. 1 Abstract: In most ecological network studies there is a focus on just one interaction type within one kind of habitat when studying the stability, robustness, build up and break down of a system in nature. Studying one interaction networks dose not give a thorough understanding of how real systems in nature are constructed. To come closer to a more comprehensive understanding of a real world system the network study in this report is scaled up to a super network including three bipartite networks (plant- pollinator, plant-herbivore and plant-pathogen networks). Furthermore, the network is crossing a habitat border to illustrate that networks span different habitats. The study was done in Moesgaard Have in Denmark with a total of 697 interactions between plants and their interaction partners. The super network was analysed for a list of network parameters including nestedness and degree distribution. It was analysed for modularity and the turnover rates of species and their links between plots were calculated.