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Peer-reviewedCC BYNature Ecology & Evolution

Increased nutrient diversity can induce loss of microbial diversity through enhanced resource uptake

  • Or Shalev1
  • Xiaozhou Ye2
  • Joachim Kilian3
  • Stahl Mark3
  • Christoph Ratzke4
4 affiliations
  1. 1Interfaculty Institute for Microbiology and Infection Medicine Tübingen (IMIT), Cluster of Excellence EXC 2124 "Controlling Microbes to Fight Infections" (CMFI), University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany. [email protected]
  2. 2Interfaculty Institute for Microbiology and Infection Medicine Tübingen (IMIT), Cluster of Excellence EXC 2124 "Controlling Microbes to Fight Infections" (CMFI), University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
  3. 3Zentrum für Molekularbiologie der Pflanzen (ZMBP), University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
  4. 4Interfaculty Institute for Microbiology and Infection Medicine Tübingen (IMIT), Cluster of Excellence EXC 2124 "Controlling Microbes to Fight Infections" (CMFI), University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany. [email protected]
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Abstract

The origin of biodiversity is a central question in ecology, particularly how numerous microbial species co-exist within a single community. A prevailing hypothesis holds that microbial species co-exist by specializing on different resources, thereby reducing competition. Accordingly, increasing resource diversity is expected to promote species co-existence and boost biodiversity. By integrating high-throughput experiments, ecological analysis of global microbiome data, metabolic profiling and theoretical modelling, we find that the relationship between resource diversity and microbial biodiversity is not consistently positive and can even decline with increasing resource diversity. This unexpected result emerges from a widespread physiological response across diverse microbial taxa, in which more complex environments trigger higher overall resource uptake. This intensifies competition and can lead to biodiversity loss. Updating a central ecological model to include this physiological trait accurately reproduces the observed decline. Our findings suggest that physiological changes at the individual level can substantially alter predicted diversity patterns and scale up to influence community structure.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{shalev2026increased,
  title = {{Increased nutrient diversity can induce loss of microbial diversity through enhanced resource uptake}},
  author = {Or Shalev and Xiaozhou Ye and Joachim Kilian and Stahl Mark and Christoph Ratzke},
  journal = {Nature Ecology \& Evolution},
  year = {2026},
  month = jul,
  doi = {10.1038/s41559-026-03111-4},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-026-03111-4},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Increased nutrient diversity can induce loss of microbial diversity through enhanced resource uptake
AU  - Or Shalev
AU  - Xiaozhou Ye
AU  - Joachim Kilian
AU  - Stahl Mark
AU  - Christoph Ratzke
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/07/20
JO  - Nature Ecology & Evolution
DO  - 10.1038/s41559-026-03111-4
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-026-03111-4
AB  - The origin of biodiversity is a central question in ecology, particularly how numerous microbial species co-exist within a single community. A prevailing hypothesis holds that microbial species co-exist by specializing on different resources, thereby reducing competition. Accordingly, increasing resource diversity is expected to promote species co-existence and boost biodiversity. By integrating high-throughput experiments, ecological analysis of global microbiome data, metabolic profiling and theoretical modelling, we find that the relationship between resource diversity and microbial biodiversity is not consistently positive and can even decline with increasing resource diversity. This unexpected result emerges from a widespread physiological response across diverse microbial taxa, in which more complex environments trigger higher overall resource uptake. This intensifies competition and can lead to biodiversity loss. Updating a central ecological model to include this physiological trait accurately reproduces the observed decline. Our findings suggest that physiological changes at the individual level can substantially alter predicted diversity patterns and scale up to influence community structure.
SN  - 2397-334X
ER  -