The Maximum Entropy Formalism of statistical mechanics in a biological application: a quantitative analysis of tropical forest ecology

Edwin Pos (1) , Luiz de Souza Coelho (2) , Diogenes de Andrade Lima Filho , Rafael Salomão , Iêda Leão Amaral , Francisca Dionízia de Almeida Matos , Carolina Castilho , Oliver Phillips , Juan Ernesto Guevara , Marcelo de Jesus Veiga Carim , Dairon Cárdenas López , William Magnusson , Florian Wittmann , Mariana Victória Irume , Maria Pires Martins , Daniel Sabatier (3) , José Renan da Silva Guimarães , Jean-François Molino (3) , Olaf Bánki , Maria Teresa Fernandez Piedade , Nigel C.A. Pitman , Abel Monteagudo Mendoza , José Ferreira Ramos , Joseph Hawes , Everton José Almeida , Luciane Ferreira Barbosa , Larissa Cavalheiro , Márcia Cléia Vilela dos Santos , Bruno Garcia Luize , Evlyn Márcia Moraes de Leão Novo , Percy Núñez Vargas , Thiago Sanna Freire Silva , Eduardo Martins Venticinque , Angelo Gilberto Manzatto , Neidiane Farias Costa Reis , John Terborgh , Katia Regina Casula , Euridice Coronado , Juan Carlos Montero , Beatriz Marimon , Ben Hur Marimon-Junior , Ted Feldpausch , Alvaro Duque , Christopher Baraloto , Nicolás Castaño Arboleda , Julien Engel (3) , Pascal Petronelli (4, 5) , Charles Eugene Zartman , Timothy Killeen , Rodolfo Vasquez , Bonifacio Mostacedo , Rafael Assis , Jochen Schöngart , Hernán Castellanos , Marcelo Brilhante de Medeiros , Marcelo Fragomeni Simon , Ana Andrade , José Luís Camargo , Layon Demarchi , William Laurance , Susan G.W. Laurance , Emanuelle de Sousa Farias , Maria Aparecida Lopes , José Leonardo Lima Magalhães , Henrique Eduardo Mendonça Nascimento , Helder Lima de Queiroz , Gerardo Aymard C. , Roel Brienen , Juan David Cardenas Revilla , Flávia R.C. Costa , Adriano Quaresma , Ima Célia Guimarães Vieira , Bruno Barçante Ladvocat Cintra , Pablo Stevenson , Yuri Oliveira Feitosa , Joost Duivenvoorden , Hugo Mogollón , Leandro Valle Ferreira , James Comiskey , Freddie Draper , José Julio de Toledo , Gabriel Damasco , Nállarett Dávila , Roosevelt García-Villacorta , Aline Lopes , Alberto Vicentini , Janaína Costa Noronha , Flávia Rodrigues Barbosa , Rainiellen de Sá Carpanedo , Thaise Emilio , Carolina Levis , Domingos de Jesus Rodrigues , Juliana Schietti , Priscila Souza , Alfonso Alonso , Francisco Dallmeier , Vitor H.F. Gomes , Jon Lloyd , David Neill , Daniel Praia Portela de Aguiar , Alejandro Araujo-Murakami , Luzmila Arroyo , Fernanda Antunes Carvalho , Fernanda Coelho de Souza , Dário Dantas Do Amaral , Kenneth Feeley , Rogerio Gribel , Marcelo Petratti Pansonato , Jos Barlow , Erika Berenguer , Joice Ferreira , Paul V.A. Fine , Marcelino Carneiro Guedes , Eliana Jimenez , Juan Carlos Licona , Maria Cristina Peñuela Mora , Carlos Peres , Boris Eduardo Villa Zegarra , Carlos Cerón , Terry Henkel , Paul Maas , Marcos Silveira , Juliana Stropp , Raquel Thomas-Caesar , Tim Baker , Doug Daly , Kyle Dexter , John Ethan Householder , Isau Huamantupa-Chuquimaco , Toby Pennington , Marcos Ríos Paredes , Alfredo Fuentes , José Luis Marcelo Pena , Miles Silman , J. Sebastián Tello , Jerome Chave (6) , Fernando Cornejo Valverde , Anthony Di Fiore , Renato Richard Hilário , Juan Fernando Phillips , Gonzalo Rivas-Torres , Tinde van Andel , Patricio von Hildebrand , Edelcilio Marques Barbosa , Luiz Carlos de Matos Bonates , Hilda Paulette Dávila Doza , Émile Fonty (7, 3) , Ricardo Zárate Gómez , Therany Gonzales , George Pepe Gallardo Gonzales , Jean-Louis Guillaumet , Bruce Hoffman , André Braga Junqueira , Yadvinder Malhi , Ires Paula de Andrade Miranda , Linder Felipe Mozombite Pinto , Adriana Prieto , Agustín Rudas , Ademir Ruschel , Natalino Silva , César I.A. Vela , Vincent Antoine Vos , Egleé Zent , Stanford Zent , Bianca Weiss Albuquerque , Angela Cano , Diego Correa , Janaina Barbosa Pedrosa Costa , Bernardo Monteiro Flores , Milena Holmgren , Marcelo Trindade Nascimento , Alexandre Oliveira , Hirma Ramirez-Angulo , Maira Rocha , Veridiana Vizoni Scudeller , Rodrigo Sierra , Milton Tirado , Maria Natalia Umaña , Geertje van Der Heijden , Emilio Vilanova Torre , Corine Vriesendorp , Ophelia Wang , Kenneth Young , Manuel Augusto Ahuite Reategui , Cláudia Baider , Henrik Balslev , Sasha Cárdenas , Luisa Fernanda Casas , William Farfan-Rios , Cid Ferreira , Reynaldo Linares-Palomino , Casimiro Mendoza , Italo Mesones , Armando Torres-Lezama , Ligia Estela Urrego Giraldo , Daniel Villarroel , Roderick Zagt , Miguel Alexiades , Karina Garcia-Cabrera , Lionel Hernandez , William Milliken , Walter Palacios Cuenca , Susamar Pansini , Daniela Pauletto , Freddy Ramirez Arevalo , Adeilza Felipe Sampaio , Elvis Valderrama Sandoval , Luis Valenzuela Gamarra , Gerhard Boenisch , Jens Kattge , Nathan Kraft , Aurora Levesley , Karina Melgaço , Georgia Pickavance , Lourens Poorter , Hans ter Steege (8)

1 Universiteit Utrecht / Utrecht University [Utrecht]
2 INPA - Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia = National Institute of Amazonian Research
3 UMR AMAP - Botanique et Modélisation de l'Architecture des Plantes et des Végétations
4 UMR ECOFOG - Ecologie des forêts de Guyane
5 Cirad-ES - Département Environnements et Sociétés
6 EDB - Evolution et Diversité Biologique
7 ONF - Direction régionale de la Guyane [Cayenne]
8 VU - Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam [Amsterdam]

In a time of rapid global change, the question of what determines patterns in species abundance distribution remains a priority for understanding the complex dynamics of ecosystems. The constrained maximization of information entropy provides a framework for the understanding of such complex systems dynamics by a quantitative analysis of important constraints via predictions using least biased probability distributions. We apply it to over two thousand hectares of Amazonian tree inventories across seven forest types and thirteen functional traits, representing major global axes of plant strategies. Results show that constraints formed by regional relative abundances of genera explain almost ten times more of local relative abundances then constraints based on either directional or stabilizing selection for specific functional traits, although the latter does show clear signals of environmental dependency. These results provide a quantitative insight by inference from large-scale data using cross-disciplinary methods, furthering our understanding of ecological dynamics.

Mots clés: Maximum entropy; Information theory; Biodiversity; Amazon rainforest

Domaines: Systématique, phylogénie et taxonomie; Ecosystèmes; Botanique; Biodiversité et Ecologie

Edwin Pos, Luiz de Souza Coelho, Diogenes de Andrade Lima Filho, Rafael Salomão, Iêda Leão Amaral, et al.. The Maximum Entropy Formalism of statistical mechanics in a biological application: a quantitative analysis of tropical forest ecology. 2021. ⟨hal-03205792⟩