naa a22 4500 510737862 CHVBK 20180411083017.0 cr unu---uuuuu 180411e20130901xx s 000 0 eng 10.1007/s11284-012-0943-7 doi (NATIONALLICENCE)springer-10.1007/s11284-012-0943-7 Environmental determinants of food-chain length: a meta-analysis [Elektronische Daten] [Gaku Takimoto, David Post] Food-chain length is an important character of ecological communities that affects many of their functional aspects. Recently, an increasing number of studies have tested the effects of productivity, disturbance, or ecosystem size on food-chain length in a variety of natural systems. Here we conduct a formal meta-analysis to summarize findings from these empirical studies. We found significant positive mean effects of productivity and ecosystem size but no significant mean effect of disturbance on food-chain length. The strength of mean effect sizes was not significantly different between productivity and ecosystem size. These results lend general support to previous theories predicting the effect of productivity and ecosystem size, but fail to support the prediction that disturbance shortens food chains. In addition, our meta-analysis found that the effect sizes of primary studies were significantly heterogeneous for ecosystem size and disturbance, but not for productivity. This pattern might reflect that ecosystem size and disturbance can affect food-chain length through multiple different mechanisms, while productivity influences food-chain length in a simple manner through energy limitation. The Ecological Society of Japan, 2012 Disturbance nationallicence Ecosystem size nationallicence Food-chain length nationallicence Random-effects meta-analysis nationallicence Productivity nationallicence Takimoto Gaku Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Toho University, 274-8510, Funabashi, Chiba, Japan aut Post David Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, 06511, New Haven, CT, USA aut Ecological Research Springer Japan 28/5(2013-09-01), 675-681 0912-3814 28:5<675 2013 28 11284 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-012-0943-7 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI 1 research-article jats NATIONALLICENCE 856 40 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-012-0943-7 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI NATIONALLICENCE 700 1- Takimoto Gaku Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Toho University, 274-8510, Funabashi, Chiba, Japan aut NATIONALLICENCE 700 1- Post David Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, 06511, New Haven, CT, USA aut NATIONALLICENCE 773 0- Ecological Research Springer Japan 28/5(2013-09-01), 675-681 0912-3814 28:5<675 2013 28 11284 Metadata rights reserved Springer special CC-BY-NC licence nationallicence BK010053 XK010053 XK010000 NATIONALLICENCE NATIONALLICENCE NL-springer