Linking biological soil crust attributes to the multifunctionality of vegetated patches and interspaces in a semiarid shrubland

1.Understanding the importance of biotic community structure on ecosystem functioning, and whether communities inhabiting different microhabitats in highly heterogeneous areas provide different ecological functions is a challenge in ecological research in the face of biodiversity and habitat loss. Biological soil crusts (BSCs) have been largely treated as unique entities, and have been mostly examined in interspaces between perennial plants, limiting current understanding of their role as drivers of ecosystem functioning and their relative contribution in comparison to vascular plants.

2.We assessed the role of BSCs on ecosystem functioning in vegetated patches and interspaces, and how individual soil functions and ecosystem multifunctionality are related to changes in BSC species- and community-level attributes. We contemplated nine ecosystem functions associated with soil water dynamics, nutrient cycling and erosion potential.

3.We found that vegetated patches improve infiltrati...