Lakes and rivers as microcosms, version 2.0

Abstract

Limnology has been greatly influenced by The lake as a Microcosm (Forbes, 1887)

Planktonic protistan communities in lakes along a large-scale environmental gradient

“…Data are limited, but reviews by Shurin et al (2009) and Jenkins (2014) indicate that dispersal limitation is relevant for lake biota, but perhaps less so for planktonic protists than for larger organisms. Ptacnik et al (2010) argue that since dissimilarity between planktonic communities tend to increase with productivity, landscapes where productive lakes are common will tend to maintain larger regional species pools than poorer ones.…”

Perspectives on the use of lakes and ponds as model systems for macroecological research

“…Studies on the biodiversity of lakes and other water bodies (herein lakes for short) have traditionally focused on local scales (i.e., within a lake), paying particular attention to local dynamics, such as mixing regimes, trophic networks or local spatial gradients (e.g., horizontal gradients in reservoirs). It was also through these local studies that the relationships of the biological component with environmental variables started to be understood (i.e., the lake as a microcosm; Forbes, 1887; see the discussion in this issue by Jenkins, 2014), providing the roots of most modern ecological knowledge (Hutchinson, 1957;Odum, 1963;Margalef, 1984;see Colwell and Rangel, 2009). However, in many regions aquatic ecologists started to sample over large spatial extents only recently.…”

“…In sum, our aim is to provide a perspective rather than a comprehensive review, considering the benefits -and some caveats-of using lentic habitats as study systems for macroecological research, and highlighting several potential future lines of research. We will focus primarily on lakes, but we note that most (if not all) of the research questions we review can also be applied to ponds (see Boukal, 2014;De Meester and Pantel, 2014;Jenkins, 2014;Gravel et al, 2014).…”

Limnology in the 21st century: the importance of freshwater ecosystems as model systems in ecology and evolution

“…The current paper provides the structure; the second one (Manca and Bertoni, 2014) (Jenkins, 2014) provides a provocative view on the failures of limnology and the attitude of limnologists by reviewing literature, by performing meta-analyses, and by highlighting idiosyncrasies on how limnology is taught during university courses and is practised as a research field.…”