DISTURBANCE TERMS |
Disturbance |
A causal event that causes a discrete change in the physical or chemical environment that has anticipated effects on a community (Rykiel, 1985; Glasby and Underwood, 1996) |
Press disturbance |
A continuous disturbance that may arise sharply but reaches a constant level that is maintained over a long period of time (Lake, 2000) |
Pulse disturbance |
A short-term, often intense disturbance that rapidly decreases in severity over a short period of time (Lake, 2000) |
COMMUNITY TERMS |
Community |
An assemblage of microorganisms that live in the same locality and potentially interact with each other or with the environment (Konopka, 2009) |
Metacommunity |
Within a regional landscape, a set of local communities whose members are linked by dispersal (Wilson, 1992; Logue et al., 2011) |
COMMUNITY RESPONSE TERMS |
Stability |
The tendency of a community to return to a mean condition after a disturbance (Pimm, 1984); includes the components of resistance and resilience |
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Ecological stability can be measured in many ways, including the persistence of populations through time, constancy of ecological attributes through time, resistance to a disturbance, or resilience after a disturbance (Worm and Duffy, 2003) |
Resistance |
The degree to which a community withstands change in the face of disturbance (Pimm, 1984; Allison and Martiny, 2008). Inverse of sensitivity
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Sensitivity |
The degree to which a community changes in response to disturbance, the inverse of resistance |
Resilience |
The rate at which a microbial community returns to its original composition after being disturbed (Allison and Martiny, 2008). Commonly referred to as community recovery. Inverse of return time |
COMMUNITY OUTCOMES |
Stable state |
A condition where a community returns to its original composition or function following a disturbance (Beisner et al., 2003). Also known as community equilibrium or an attractor |
Alternative stable state |
A condition where a community moves to a different but stable composition or function following a disturbance. One of multiple, non-transitory stable states in which a community can exist (Beisner et al., 2003) |
Regime shift |
A large change in community composition arising from a shift between alternative stable states (Scheffer and Carpenter, 2003) |