Fungal influence on density dependence: Tree species in highly diverse tropical forests tend to exhibit conspecific negative density dependence, a phenomenon whereby individuals of the same species tend to grow at a distance from one another. This is understood to be a key driver of species coexistence. The strength of negative density dependence varies between species, but the mechanisms driving this variation are unknown. Chen et al. studied tree species in a subtropical forest in China and found an important role for soil-dwelling fungi in this variation. Elevated accumulation of pathogenic fungi leads to stronger negative density dependence, whereas elevated accumulation of mutualistic fungi leads to weaker negative density dependence. Science , this issue p. 124

Ecology cannot yet fully explain why so many tree species coexist in natural communities such as tropical forests. A major difficulty is linking individual-level processes to community dynamics. We propose a combination of tree spatial data, spatial statistics and dynamical theory to reveal the relationship between spatial patterns and population-level interaction coefficients and their consequences for multispecies dynamics and coexistence. Here we show that the emerging population-level interaction coefficients have, for a broad range of circumstances, a simpler structure than their individual-level counterparts, which allows for an analytical treatment of equilibrium and stability conditions. Mechanisms such as animal seed dispersal, which result in clustering of recruits that is decoupled from parent locations, lead to a rare-species advantage and coexistence of otherwise neutral competitors. Linking spatial statistics with theories of community dynamics offers new avenues for explaining species coexistence and calls for rethinking community ecology through a spatial lens.