FIG 2.

Conceptual overview of compositional and functional responses of microbial communities to a disturbance. Initially, both microbial community composition and function change in response to the disturbance, where resistance refers to the degree of initial change. Subsequently, four simplified scenarios for recovery are possible: A, complete recovery; B, only composition recovers but not function (physiological adaptation); C, only function recovers but not composition (functional redundancy); and D, no recovery. Resistance, recovery, recovery rate (engineering resilience), and temporal stability are 4 aspects that describe the overall compositional and functional resilience or stability of the community (25, 26) and are expected to be influenced by disturbance, community, and habitat properties that, in addition, also modulate effects of community assembly processes on resilience. In this review, the term microbial resilience is used in the broadest sense to encompass the vast variety of definitions used in the literature (see the text) and mainly covers resistance, recovery, and engineering resilience, as the majority of studies in microbial ecology have focused on these metrics.