DOI: 10.5061/dryad.z34tmpgnw
title: Data from: Ecosystem engineers shape ecological network structure and stability: a framework and literature review

description: Ecosystem engineering is a ubiquitous process where species influence the
 physical environment and thereby structure ecological communities.
 However, there has been little effort to synthesise or predict how
 ecosystem engineering may impact the structure and stability of
 interaction networks. To assess the current scientific understanding of
 ecosystem engineering impacts via habitat forming, habitat modification,
 and bioturbation on interaction networks/food webs, we reviewed the
 literature covering marine, freshwater, and terrestrial food webs,
 plant-pollinator networks, and theory. We provide a conceptual framework
 and identify three major pathways of engineering impact on networks
 through changes in resource availability and energy flow, habitat
 heterogeneity, and environmental filtering. These three processes often
 work in concert and most studies report that engineering increases species
 richness. This is particularly marked for engineers that increase habitat
 heterogeneity and thereby the number of available niches. The response of
 network structure to ecosystem engineering varies, however some patterns
 emerge from this review. Engineered habitat heterogeneity leads to a
 higher number of links between species in the networks and increases link
 density. Connectance can be negatively or positively affected by ecosystem
 engineer impact, depending on the engineering pathway and the engineer
 impact of species richness. We discuss how ecosystem engineers can
 stabilize or destabilize communities through the changes in niche space,
 diversity, network structure, and the dependency on the engineering
 impact. Theory and empirical evidence need to inform each other to better
 integrate ecosystem engineering and ecological networks. A mechanistic
 understanding how ecosystem engineering traits shape interactions networks
 and their stability will be important to predict species extinctions and
 can provide crucial information for conservation and ecosystem
 restoration.
description: To link engineering impact to network or food web responses, we
 searched the literature using a set of search strings in Web of
 Science. We searched Web of Science on the 22nd of May
 2023 with two search strings that complemented each other. The first one
 used the keywords "ecosystem engineer" AND "food web"
 OR network which resulted in 258 studies. The second search used
 "ecosystem engineer" OR facilitation OR "foundation
 species" OR "non-trophic" OR bioturbation AND ("food
 web" OR "trophic web" OR "interaction network*"
 OR "ecological network" OR "pollination network" OR
 "seed*dispersal network") and retrieved an initial number of 544
 studies. This second search widened the review to studies beyond the word
 “ecosystem engineering”. We only included primary
 research that measured the response of the community or network structure
 to the impact of an engineer species, resulting in 36 studies (with two
 studies reporting each two separate engineer impact cases). For each
 study, we extracted information about engineer identity, whether it was
 native or exotic, the community/food web/network, the engineer
 classification (habitat forming, habitat modification, bioturbation), the
 main outcomes for diversity, and the structure of the network or food web,
 such as network metric(s) and functional composition that have been
 measured.
description: # Ecosystem engineers shape ecological network structure and stability: a
 framework and literature review
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z34tmpgnw](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z34tmpgnw) This dataset contains the result of a literature search on the Web of Science to link the impact of species that act as ecosystem engineers to their impact of the food web or network structure.  ## Description of the data and file structure For each study, we provide the identity of the engineer species (common name, broad taxon, and species), classified whether it was native or exotic, the community/food web/network that is exposed to the engineering, the changes to the environment through abiotic conditions, nontrophic resources and trophic resources, and whether the engineer is a habitat former, habitat modifier or does bioturbation. We then report the main identified engineering pathway (habitat heterogeneity, resource and energy flow or environmental filter), the direction if impact for habitat heterogeneity and the main outcomes for the diversity of the community and the complexity of the network or food web, we also record which network metric(s) have been measured. For WOSsearch see above first and second search.