TY - JOUR T1 - Spatio-temporal patterns of multi-trophic biodiversity and food-web characteristics across a river catchment JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/2021.07.20.450136 SP - 2021.07.20.450136 AU - Rosetta C. Blackman AU - Hsi-Cheng Ho AU - Jean-Claude Walser AU - Florian Altermatt Y1 - 2021/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/07/20/2021.07.20.450136.abstract N2 - Accurate characterisation of ecological communities with respect to their biodiversity and food-web structure is essential for conservation. However, combined empirical study of biodiversity and multi-trophic food webs at a large spatial and temporal resolution has been prohibited by the lack of appropriate access to such data from natural systems. Here, we assessed biodiversity and food-web characteristics across a 700 km2 riverine network through time using environmental DNA. We find contrasting biodiversity patterns, with richness (α-diversity) of fish increasing towards downstream positions within the catchment, while freshwater bacteria and invertebrates having an invariant and minimal decrease in richness, respectively, with downstream position. Food-web characteristics, such as link density and nestedness, however, were relatively conserved across space, but varied over season. Patterns of biodiversity across major taxonomic groups are thus not directly scalable to food-web structures at the same spatial and temporal scales, indicating that effective conservation measures must consider them jointly.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. ER -