We examined the relative importance of spatial processes (dispersal-related) and environmental processes (environmental selection-related) in community structure for macrobenthos (including juveniles and adults) and meroplanktonic larvae in the subtidal areas of Daya Bay, China. We found that both macrobenthos and meroplanktonic larvae showed similar spatial patterns, both following the distance-decay relationship. The results of variation partitioning analysis (VPA) showed the roles of both spatial and environmental factors in governing the assembly of both communities, although both explained only a small (slightly larger for spatial factor) fraction of the community variation. We also found that macrobenthos were more affected by spatial processes than meroplanktonic larvae. In addition, we highlight that the mechanisms determining community structure change according to the spatial extent considered.

我们研究了大亚湾潮下地区大型底栖动物（包括幼体和成虫）和浮游幼虫的群落结构中空间过程（与扩散相关）和环境过程（与环境选择相关）的相对重要性。我们发现，大型底栖动物和浮游性幼虫都表现出相似的空间格局，都遵循距离-衰减关系。变异分区分析（VPA）的结果显示了空间因素和环境因素在控制两个社区的装配中的作用，尽管两者都仅解释了社区变异的一小部分（对于空间因素而言稍大）。我们还发现，大型底栖动物比浮游幼虫受空间过程的影响更大。此外，