The relationship between metapopulation stability and connectivity has long been investigated in ecology, however, most of these studies are focused on theoretical species and habitat networks, having limited ability to capture the complexity of real-world metapopulations. Network analysis became more important in modeling connectivity, but it is still uncertain which network metrics are reliable predictors of persistence. Here we quantify the impact of connectivity and larval life history on marine metapopulation persistence across the complex seascape of southeast Australia. Our work coupled network-based approaches and eigenanalysis to efficiently estimate metapopulation-wide persistence and the subpopulation contributions. Larval dispersal models were used to quantify species-specific metapopulation connectivity for five important fisheries species, each summarized as a migration matrix. Eigenanalysis helped to reveal metapopulation persistence and determine the importance of node-level network properties. Across metapopulations, the number of local outgoing connections was found to have the largest impact on metapopulation persistence, implying these hub subpopulations may be the most influential in real-world metapopulations. Results also suggest the length of the pre-competency period may be the most influential parameter on metapopulation persistence. Finally, we identified two major hot spots of local connectivity in southeast Australia, each contributing strongly to multispecies persistence. Managers and ecologists would benefit by employing similar approaches in making more efficient and more ecologically informed decisions and focusing more on local connectivity patterns and larval competency characteristics to better understand and protect real-world metapopulation persistence. Practically this could mean developing more marine protected areas at shorter distances and supporting collaborative research into the early life histories of the species of interest.

中文翻译：

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局部连接和幼虫能力强烈影响海洋复合种群的持久性

长期以来，生态学一直在研究群落稳定性和连通性之间的关系，然而，这些研究大多集中在理论物种和栖息地网络上，捕捉现实世界群落复杂性的能力有限。网络分析在连接性建模中变得更加重要，但仍不确定哪些网络指标是持久性的可靠预测指标。在这里，我们量化了连通性和幼虫生活史对澳大利亚东南部复杂海景中海洋复合种群持久性的影响。我们的工作结合了基于网络的方法和特征分析，以有效估计元种群范围内的持久性和亚种群的贡献。幼虫扩散模型用于量化五种重要渔业物种的物种特异性集合种群连通性，每个物种总结为迁移矩阵。特征分析有助于揭示元种群的持久性并确定节点级网络属性的重要性。在元群中，发现本地传出连接的数量对元群持久性的影响最大，这意味着这些中心亚群可能是现实世界中最有影响力的元群。结果还表明，能力前阶段的长度可能是对元种群持久性影响最大的参数。最后，我们确定了澳大利亚东南部本地连接的两个主要热点，每个热点都对多物种的持久性做出了重大贡献。管理者和生态学家将受益于采用类似的方法来做出更有效和更生态知情的决策，并更多地关注本地连接模式和幼虫能力特征，以更好地了解和保护现实世界的复合种群持久性。实际上，这可能意味着在更短的距离内开发更多的海洋保护区，并支持对感兴趣物种早期生活史的合作研究。