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Concept
Alpha diversity
Summary
In ecology, alpha diversity (α-diversity) is the mean species diversity in a site at a local scale. The term was introduced by R. H. Whittaker together with the terms beta diversity (β-diversity) and gamma diversity (γ-diversity). Whittaker's idea was that the total species diversity in a landscape (gamma diversity) is determined by two different things, the mean species diversity in sites at a more local scale (alpha diversity) and the differentiation among those sites (beta diversity).
Both the area or landscape of interest and the sites within it may be of very different sizes in different situations, and no consensus has been reached on what spatial scales are appropriate to quantify alpha diversity. It has therefore been proposed that the definition of alpha diversity does not need to be tied to a specific spatial scale: alpha diversity can be measured for an existing dataset that consists of subunits at any scale. The subunits can be, for example, sampling units that were already used in the field when carrying out the inventory, or grid cells that are delimited just for the purpose of analysis. If results are extrapolated beyond the actual observations, it needs to be taken into account that the species diversity in the subunits generally gives an underestimation of the species diversity in larger areas.
Ecologists have used several slightly different definitions of alpha diversity. Whittaker himself used the term both for the species diversity in a single subunit and for the mean species diversity in a collection of subunits. It has been argued that defining alpha diversity as a mean across all relevant subunits is preferable, because it agrees better with Whittaker's idea that total species diversity consists of alpha and beta components.
Definitions of alpha diversity can also differ in what they assume species diversity to be. Often researchers use the values given by one or more diversity indices, such as species richness (which is simply a count of species), the Shannon index or the Simpson index (which take into account also species proportional abundances).
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