Ecosystem dynamics is often considered driven by a coupling of species’ resource consumption and its population size dynamics. Such resource-population dynamics is captured by MacArthur-type models. One biologically relevant feature that would also need to be captured by such models is the introduction of new and different species. Speciation introduces a stochastic component in the otherwise deterministic MacArthur theory. We describe here how speciation can be implemented to yield a model that is consistent with current theory on equilibrium resource-consumer models, but also displays readily observable rank diversity metric changes. The model also reproduces a priority effect. Adding speciation to a MacArthur-style model provides an attractively simple extension to explore the rich dynamics in evolving ecosystems.

生态系统动态通常被认为是由物种资源消耗与其种群规模动态耦合驱动的。麦克阿瑟类型的模型捕捉到了这种资源-人口动态。这种模型还需要捕获的一项生物学相关特征是新的不同物种的引入。物种形成在决定性的麦克阿瑟理论中引入了随机成分。我们在这里描述了如何实现物种形成来产生一个与当前平衡资源-消费者模型理论一致的模型，但也显示了易于观察的等级多样性度量变化。该模型还再现了优先效应。将物种形成添加到麦克阿瑟式模型中，提供了一个极具吸引力的简单扩展，可以探索不断发展的生态系统中的丰富动态。