Dominance to egalitarian transition in diverse communities

Abstract

Diverse communities of competing species are generally characterized by substantial niche overlap and strongly stochastic dynamics. Abundance fluctuations are proportional to population size, so the dynamics of rare populations is slower. Hence, once a population becomes rare, its abundance gets stuck at low values. Here, we analyze the effect of this phenomenon on community structure. We identify two different phases: a dominance phase, in which a tiny number of species constitute most of the community, and an egalitarian phase, where it takes a finite fraction of all species to constitute most of the community. We demonstrate the validity of the theory using empirical findings for a variety of hyperdiverse communities, and clarify the role of demographic stochasticity in shaping patterns of commonness and rarity.