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Functionally unique, specialised, and endangered (FUSE) species: towards integrated metrics for the conservation prioritisation toolbox

J. N. Griffin, F. Leprieur, D. Silvestro, J. S. Lefcheck, C. Albouy, D. B. Rasher, M. Davis, J.-C. Svenning, C. Pimiento
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.09.084871
J. N. Griffin
1Department of Biosciences, Swansea University, Wallace Building, Singleton Park, Swansea, SA2 8PP, UK
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  • For correspondence: j.n.griffin@swansea.ac.uk
F. Leprieur
2MARBEC, Université de Montpellier, CNRS, Ifremer, IRD, Montpellier, France
3Institut Universitaire de France (IUF), France
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D. Silvestro
4Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, 1700, Switzerland
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J. S. Lefcheck
5Tennenbaum Marine Observatories Network, MarineGEO, Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, Edgewater, MD 21037 USA
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C. Albouy
6IFREMER, Unité Ecologie et Modèles pour l’Halieutique, Nantes Cedex 3, France
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D. B. Rasher
7Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, 60 Bigelow Drive, East Boothbay, ME 04544, USA
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M. Davis
8Center for Biodiversity Dynamics in a Changing World (BIOCHANGE) and Section for Ecoinformatics and Biodiversity, Department of Biology, Aarhus University, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
9Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, 900 Exposition Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90007 USA
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J.-C. Svenning
9Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, 900 Exposition Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90007 USA
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C. Pimiento
1Department of Biosciences, Swansea University, Wallace Building, Singleton Park, Swansea, SA2 8PP, UK
10Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Box 2072, Balboa, Panama
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Abstract

Identifying species with disproportionate contributions to biodiversity can lead to effective conservation prioritisation. Despite well-established methods for identifying endangered species adding inordinately to evolutionary diversity, in this context functional diversity has been overlooked. Here, we compare different metrics designed to identify threatened species that contribute strongly to functional diversity. We use the diverse and threatened global marine megafauna as a case study. We found that functional contributions of species are not fully captured in a single metric. Although we found a very strong correlation between functional specialisation and distinctiveness, functional uniqueness was only moderately correlated with the other two metrics and identified a different set of top-10 species. These functional contributions were then integrated and combined with extinction risk to identify species that are both important contributors to functional diversity and endangered. For instance, the top-10 Functionally Unique Specialized and Endangered (FUSE) species contains three critically endangered, five endangered and two vulnerable species which - despite comprising only 3% of species - are among the top 10% most functionally unique and hold 15% of the global functional richness. The FUSE index was remarkably robust to different mathematical formulations. Combining one or more facets of a species contribution to functional diversity with endangerment, such as with the FUSE index, adds to the toolbox for conservation prioritisation. Nevertheless, we discuss how these new tools must be handled with care alongside other metrics and information.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.
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Posted May 10, 2020.
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Functionally unique, specialised, and endangered (FUSE) species: towards integrated metrics for the conservation prioritisation toolbox
J. N. Griffin, F. Leprieur, D. Silvestro, J. S. Lefcheck, C. Albouy, D. B. Rasher, M. Davis, J.-C. Svenning, C. Pimiento
bioRxiv 2020.05.09.084871; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.09.084871
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Functionally unique, specialised, and endangered (FUSE) species: towards integrated metrics for the conservation prioritisation toolbox
J. N. Griffin, F. Leprieur, D. Silvestro, J. S. Lefcheck, C. Albouy, D. B. Rasher, M. Davis, J.-C. Svenning, C. Pimiento
bioRxiv 2020.05.09.084871; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.09.084871

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