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Climate variability disrupts microbial mutualism-driven population persistence

Nature Ecology & Evolution (2026)Cite this article

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Abstract

Understanding how species interactions impact population dynamics and long-term persistence over broad temporal and spatial scales is crucial for predicting species distributions and responses to global change. Here we investigate how microbial mutualisms can promote long-term and range-wide population persistence of plants, particularly by ameliorating drought stress. We integrate range-wide field surveys of ~90 grass host populations spanning 13 years with demographic modelling based on 6-year common garden experiments conducted across the host range. We found that mutualistic fungal endophytes (genus Epichloë) promote population-level persistence and growth of their native host grass (Bromus laevipes) across its distribution, with non-mutualistic populations four times more likely to go locally extinct. However, endophyte prevalence declined eightfold more in historically mutualistic populations that experienced high climate variability. This demonstrates that mutualisms can underpin population persistence and buffer hosts against environmental stress but may themselves be vulnerable to global change, with concerning implications for long-term population viability and, ultimately, species distributions under an increasingly uncertain climate.

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Fig. 1: A map of surveyed B. laevipes populations.
Fig. 2: Plant population persistence increased with historical endophyte prevalence and decreased with fire occurrence.
Fig. 3: Endophytes enhanced population growth rates, largely through promoting host fecundity.
Fig. 4: Positive endophyte contributions to population growth had a unimodal relationship with aridity and declined with increasing climate variability.
Fig. 5: Current endophyte prevalence has declined with increasing climate variability.

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Data availability

All datasets involved are available via Zenodo at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17379577 (ref. 83). Raw climate data are available from the PRISM Group (https://prism.oregonstate.edu/).

Code availability

Code to replicate our analyses and associated datasets are available via Zenodo at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17379577 (ref. 83).

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Acknowledgements

We thank the University of California Natural Reserve System, particularly the McLaughlin, Quail Ridge, Hastings and Angelo Reserves, for providing protected natural habitats in which to conduct our experiments; the US Forest Service for their support of this project; and UC Reserve and Forest Service staff: J. Huhndorf, P. Aigner, C. Koehler, M. Power, J. Hunter, P. Steel, A. Spyres, R. Brennan, V. Boucher, J. Clary, L. Johnson and M. Stromberg. We also thank the Afkhami and Searcy laboratories, especially D. Hernandez, K. Kiesewetter, A. O’Brien and R. Rumelt, as well as W. Browne and D. DeAngelis for helpful feedback on analyses and the manuscript. This research was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant nos. NSF DEB-2030060 and NSF DEB-1922521 to M.E.A. and C.A.S.).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA

    Vicki W. Li, Joshua C. Fowler, Christopher A. Searcy & Michelle E. Afkhami

  2. Archbold Biological Station, Venus, FL, USA

    Aaron S. David

  3. Department of Evolution and Ecology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

    Sharon Y. Strauss

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  1. Vicki W. Li
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Contributions

V.W.L. collected field survey data, performed data analysis and demographic modelling and wrote the manuscript. J.C.F. contributed to demographic model construction and manuscript revisions. A.S.D. contributed to building and writing methods for the demographic model and manuscript revisions. S.Y.S. contributed to the conceptualization and design of the common garden experiments as well as the manuscript revisions and student supervision. C.A.S. contributed to survey data collection, manuscript revisions and feedback on modelling and statistical analyses. M.E.A. led overall project conception and contributed to data collection for field surveys and common gardens, common garden experimental design and establishment, feedback on analyses, manuscript revisions and student supervision.

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Correspondence to Vicki W. Li.

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Li, V.W., Fowler, J.C., David, A.S. et al. Climate variability disrupts microbial mutualism-driven population persistence. Nat Ecol Evol (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-025-02943-w

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