Tropical secondary forests are increasingly important for carbon sequestration and biodiversity conservation worldwide; yet, we still cannot accurately predict community turnover during secondary succession. We propose that integrating niche differentiation and dispersal limitation will generate an improved theoretical explanation of tropical forest succession. The interaction between seed sources and dispersers regulates seed movement throughout succession, and recent technological advances in animal tracking and molecular analyses enable us to accurately monitor seed movement as never before. We propose a framework to bridge the gap between niche differentiation and dispersal limitation. The Source-Disperser Limitation Framework (SDLF) provides a way to better predict secondary tropical forest succession across gradients of landscape disturbance by integrating seed sources and frugivore behavior.

热带次生林对全世界的碳固存和生物多样性保护越来越重要；然而，我们仍然无法准确预测二次演替期间的社区更替。我们建议整合生态位分化和扩散限制将产生对热带森林演替的改进理论解释。种子源和分散器之间的相互作用在整个演替过程中调节种子运动，最近动物追踪和分子分析方面的技术进步使我们能够以前所未有的方式准确监测种子运动。我们提出了一个框架来弥合利基分化和分散限制之间的差距。