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...be? Unless we consider the richness in evolutionary information as a value per se, we need other convincing arguments. These arguments usually follow the same lines as used for conserving species richness and can be seen in the context of conserving ecosystem processes and thus providing insurance against the consequences of short-term and Opinion Trends in Ecology and Evolution xxx xxxx, Vol. xxx, No. x TREE-1632; No. of Pages 6long-term environmental changes. In the context of phylogenetic diversity, common arguments are to consider phylogenetic diversity as a proxy for functional diversity [33] and as a measure of evolutionary potential [26]. Phylogenetic diversity as a proxy for functional diversity It is argued that phylogenetically distinct species are likely to also have distinct functional traits. For example, the African plant Welwitschia mirabilis is the only member of the family Welwitschiaceae. Due to its unique combination of life history and leaf traits, it is one of the very few plants able to survive under extreme arid conditions and thus serves as an important refuge for many desert animals. Intuitively, the loss of evolutionarily distinct species is assumed to constit...

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... accurate calibrations [42,43,48] Unknown evolutionary models underlying ecological traits and life-history variation Even when phylogenies are known with low uncertainty in all aspects, there is a lack of knowledge about how traits evolved and how evolutionary processes create more complex patterns that cannot be described by phylogenetic relations alone Establish the most important ecological traits for particular conservation targets and fit evolutionary models to these traits [57,63], then adjust edge lengths to account for these patterns and calculate diversity based on these phylogenies [14,64] Evaluate robustness of diversity estimates to multiple theoretical models of trait divergence and develop strategies to combine such models [14,64] Use empirical measures that combine phylogenetic information and trait data directly in generalized distance matrices [51] Opinion Trends in Ecology & Evolution xxx xxxx, Vol. xxx, No. x TREE-1747; No. of Pages 7of the species to be incorporated into phylogenetic analyses is possible, [40], as are multilevel approaches for constructing ‘megatrees’ [36–38]. Importantly, new approaches can combine genetic data, taxonomies, and reasonable diversifica...

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...ly, the application of phylogenetic approaches has revitalized the study of community assembly by addressing the phylogenetic structure of communities (Webb et al., 2002; Johnson & Stinchcombe, 2007; =-=Mouquet et al., 2012-=-). However, few studies have investigated the phylogenetic structure of whole oceanic island assemblages. Cardillo et al. (2008) observed random phylogenetic structure in the mammal assemblages of man...

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...n be used to effectively estimate similarity in how species interact among themselves and their environment (Webb et al. 2002; Emerson & Gillespie 2008; Kraft et al. 2008; Cavender-Bares et al. 2009; =-=Mouquet et al. 2012-=-). Habitat preferences and traits associated with these preferences emphasise the role of Grinnellian niches (Grinnell 1917). In comparison, traits associated with Eltonian niches – those defined by c...

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...ssess their reliability. Since the taxonomic structure of assemblages, based on species membership to a given family, may influence the functional structure thanks to phylogenetic trait conservatism (=-=Mouquet et al., 2012-=-), we tested whether closely related fish assemblages, on the basis of their taxonomic structure, were also functionally more similar. To this end, we implemented Mantel tests between pairs of dissimi...

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...s, for example. Thus, the use of PD in biodiversity–ecosystem functioning research (B-EF) and as a conservation tool remains ambiguous due to a lack of a solid conceptual basis and empirical support (=-=Mouquet et al. 2012-=-; Srivastava et al. 2012; Pavoine et al. 2013; Winter et al. 2013) and because it does not guaranty the conservation of the “most diverse set of biological features” (Kelly et al. 2014). Few high-leve...

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...long broad environmental gradients in the Swiss Alps (Pellissier et al. 2013). Because phylogenies provide relevant information to understand and predict species trophic associations and assemblages (=-=Mouquet et al. 2012-=-; Whitfeld et al. 2012; Best et al. 2013; Pellissier et al. 2013), we reconstructed two species-level phylogenies for plant species and butterfly species. We also measured several commonly used plant ...

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...ly, the application of phylogenetic approaches has revitalized the study of community assembly by addressing the phylogenetic structure of communities (Webb et al., 2002; Johnson & Stinchcombe, 2007; =-=Mouquet et al., 2012-=-). However, few studies have investigated the phylogenetic structure of whole oceanic island assemblages. Cardillo et al. (2008) observed random phylogenetic structure in the mammal assemblages of man...