Benthic habitats constitute the largest single ecosystem on earth in spatial coverage and support the provision of important and valuable ecosystem services (i.e., nutrient cycling, primary production, air quality, and climate regulation). However, the global loss of biodiversity threatens unique biota and the functioning and services of the benthic ecosystem essential for human health and wellbeing. In this context, an increasing interest in the predictability of the function of benthic ecosystems has been raised. Besides biomass and abundance, the identity of organisms in terms of their activity and function is known to influence both, the magnitude, and the variability of ecosystem processes. Biological trait analysis is a widely spread approach that has led to a better understanding of the role of species within a community and the relationship between ecological functions, spatial distribution, and environmental characteristics.

The biological traits approaches are based on the idea that ecosystem functions have well-established relationships with biological communities. While this is well-known for individual species in experiments, it is still understudied how species functional traits on a community at a regional scale are related to ecosystem functioning. For example, the linkage of biological traits with ecosystem functions may be more complex at a large scale since it may be affected by environmental variability, species interactions, and last but not least, human-induced disturbances. In this context, recent research should aim to increase efforts to determine the links between trait combinations and environmental variability, and ecosystem functions.

Under an evolutionary consideration, species habitat occupancy and vulnerability combined with human pressures on ecosystems lead toward specific response trait combinations known as “life strategies”. Whereas the relationships between response traits lead to life strategies, there is still no generality regarding effect traits and associated functional groups. To this end, the question is what kind of spatio-temporal effect trait patterns can be expected in different areas from polar to tropical zones.

The Research Topic focuses on original and novel studies investigating the links between the biodiversity and functioning of benthic ecosystems and the resulting ecosystem services in the Anthropocene. The collection welcomes original research, revision, and meta-analysis articles that include biological traits approaches and examine ecosystem functioning response to any type of change. Specific themes should be related, but not limited, to one of the following:

• Can we expect similar trait predictions in habitat occupancy (response traits; growth, survival, and reproduction) from polar to tropical areas

• What kind of spatio-temporal effect trait patterns can we expect in various areas

• What kind of effect traits should be considered to account for ecosystem function

• Functional adaptation of benthic communities in Anthropocene

• How human activities impact the relationship between functional traits and specific benthic ecosystem processes

• How species interaction affects ecosystem functioning

The studies must include (i) a justification for the selection of specific traits relative to the study objectives, and (ii) a report of the traits data origin along with its citations.

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Frontiers in Marine Science

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