The Structure of Plant-Animal Mutualistic Networks

Abstract Plant-animal mutualistic networks can be described as bipartite graphs depicting the interactions between two distinct sets: plants and animals. These mutualistic networks have been found to be highly structured. Specifically, they show a nested pattern in which specialists interact with proper subsets of the set of species with which generalists interact. This pattern is important for understanding coevolution in species rich communities, which can be reduced neither to pairs of coevolving species nor to diffuse, randomly interacting assemblages. We discuss the dynamic implications of network structure from the points of view of coevolution, community ecology, and conservation biology.