From minute differences in the structure of proteins to wholesale changes in ecosystems, variation in ’replicate’ biological units underpins the complexity of the natural world and defines our understanding of biodiversity. Interestingly, separate but related processes shape these trait differences across biological scales (e.g. microevolution in populations versus assembly of communities). These processes occur simultaneously in all natural systems, but are only rarely considered together, stunting a holistic understanding of multi-scale biological systems. Here, I use dragonfly larvae to investigate (1) how traits are linked to one another across biological scales, (2) the relative importance of trait change at different biological scales, and (3) the ecosystem consequences of multi-scale trait change.

Image credit: Tobias David Mankis