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Discerning the thermodynamic feasibility of the spontaneous coexistence of multiple functional vegetation groups.

ABSTRACT: Can the Second Law of Thermodynamics explain why ecosystems naturally organize into a complex structure composed of multiple vegetation species and functional groups? Ecosystem structure, which refers to the number and type of plant functional groups, is the result of self-organization, or the spontaneous emergence of order from random fluctuations. By considering ecosystems as open thermodynamic systems, we model and study these fluctuations of throughput signatures on short timescales to determine the drivers and characteristics of ecosystem structure. This diagnostic approach allows us to use fluxes of energy and entropy to calculate an ecosystem's estimated work and understand the thermodynamic behavior of the system. We use a multi-layer canopy-root-soil model to calculate the energy and entropy fluxes of different scenarios for field sites across various climates. At each site, scenarios comprised of native individual plant functional groups and a coexisting multi-group composition scenario including all functional groups observed at the site are compared. Ecosystem-scale calculations demonstrate that entropy fluxes and work efficiency-the work performed for the amount of radiation entering the ecosystem-are greatest in the multi-group scenario when its leaf area is significantly larger than each of its individual functional groups. Thus, we conclude that ecosystems self-organize towards the vegetation structure with the greatest outgoing entropy flux and work efficiency, resulting in the coexistence of multiple functional groups and performing the maximum amount of work within the constraints of locally available energy, water, and nutrients.

SUBMITTER: Richardson M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7591582 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Discerning the thermodynamic feasibility of the spontaneous coexistence of multiple functional vegetation groups.

Richardson Meredith M Kumar Praveen P

Scientific reports 20201027 1

Can the Second Law of Thermodynamics explain why ecosystems naturally organize into a complex structure composed of multiple vegetation species and functional groups? Ecosystem structure, which refers to the number and type of plant functional groups, is the result of self-organization, or the spontaneous emergence of order from random fluctuations. By considering ecosystems as open thermodynamic systems, we model and study these fluctuations of throughput signatures on short timescales to deter ...[more]

PMID: 33110133

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Project description:MotivationThe expansion of cancer genome sequencing continues to stimulate development of analytical tools for inferring relationships between somatic changes and tumor development. Pathway associations are especially consequential, but existing algorithms are demonstrably inadequate.MethodsHere, we propose the PathScan significance test for the scenario where pathway mutations collectively contribute to tumor development. Its design addresses two aspects that established methods neglect. First, we account for variations in gene length and the consequent differences in their mutation probabilities under the standard null hypothesis of random mutation. The associated spike in computational effort is mitigated by accurate convolution-based approximation. Second, we combine individual probabilities into a multiple-sample value using Fisher-Lancaster theory, thereby improving differentiation between a few highly mutated genes and many genes having only a few mutations apiece. We investigate accuracy, computational effort and power, reporting acceptable performance for each.ResultsAs an example calculation, we re-analyze KEGG-based lung adenocarcinoma pathway mutations from the Tumor Sequencing Project. Our test recapitulates the most significant pathways and finds that others for which the original test battery was inconclusive are not actually significant. It also identifies the focal adhesion pathway as being significantly mutated, a finding consistent with earlier studies. We also expand this analysis to other databases: Reactome, BioCarta, Pfam, PID and SMART, finding additional hits in ErbB and EPHA signaling pathways and regulation of telomerase. All have implications and plausible mechanistic roles in cancer. Finally, we discuss aspects of extending the method to integrate gene-specific background rates and other types of genetic anomalies.AvailabilityPathScan is implemented in Perl and is available from the Genome Institute at: http://genome.wustl.edu/software/pathscan.

Dataset Information

Discerning the thermodynamic feasibility of the spontaneous coexistence of multiple functional vegetation groups.

Publications

Discerning the thermodynamic feasibility of the spontaneous coexistence of multiple functional vegetation groups.

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