Forest ecosystems are an integral component of the global carbon cycle as they take up and release large amounts of C in short time (C flux) or accumulate it over longer time (C stock). However, there remains uncertainty about whether and in which direction C fluxes and in particular C stocks may differ between forests of high vs. low species richness. Based on a comprehensive dataset derived from field-based measurements, we tested the effect of...

Grime's CSR species life-strategy theory (competition-stress-ruderality) provides a conceptual framework to classify species into competitive (high productivity, low disturbance), stress-tolerant (low productivity, low disturbance) and ruderal (high productivity, high disturbance). Importantly, this classification is based on the assumption that the niche space of disturbance and productivity is filled unevenly: while in productive habitats species can adapt to different disturbance regimes, species of low-productivity and disturbed habitats do not exist, resulting in a triangular distribution of...

High species diversity may result from recent rapid speciation in a ‘cradle’ and/or the gradual accumulation and preservation of species over time in a ‘museum’1,2. China harbours nearly 10% of angiosperm species worldwide and has long been considered as both a museum, owing to the presence of many species with hypothesized ancient origins3,4, and a cradle, as many lineages have originated as recent topographic changes and climatic shifts—such as the formation of the Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau...

Biodiversity experiments have shown that species loss reduces ecosystem functioning in grassland. To test whether this result can be extrapolated to forests, the main contributors to terrestrial primary productivity, requires large-scale experiments. We manipulated tree species richness by planting more than 150,000 trees in plots with 1 to 16 species. Simulating multiple extinction scenarios, we found that richness strongly increased stand-level productivity. After 8 years, 16-species mixtures had accumulated over twice the amount of carbon...