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6706677 
Journal Article 
Review 
Tri-trophic interactions: bridging species, communities and ecosystems 
Abdala-Roberts, L; Puentes, A; Finke, DL; Marquis, RJ; Montserrat, M; Poelman, EH; Rasmann, S; Sentis, A; van Dam, NM; Wimp, G; Mooney, K; Björkman, C 
2019 
Yes 
Ecology Letters
ISSN: 1461-023X
EISSN: 1461-0248 
22 
12 
2151-2167 
English 
31631502 
WOS:000491096100001 
A vast body of research demonstrates that many ecological and evolutionary processes can only be understood from a tri-trophic viewpoint, that is, one that moves beyond the pairwise interactions of neighbouring trophic levels to consider the emergent features of interactions among multiple trophic levels. Despite its unifying potential, tri-trophic research has been fragmented, following two distinct paths. One has focused on the population biology and evolutionary ecology of simple food chains of interacting species. The other has focused on bottom-up and top-down controls over the distribution of biomass across trophic levels and other ecosystem-level variables. Here, we propose pathways to bridge these two long-standing perspectives. We argue that an expanded theory of tri-trophic interactions (TTIs) can unify our understanding of biological processes across scales and levels of organisation, ranging from species evolution and pairwise interactions to community structure and ecosystem function. To do so requires addressing how community structure and ecosystem function arise as emergent properties of component TTIs, and, in turn, how species traits and TTIs are shaped by the ecosystem processes and the abiotic environment in which they are embedded. We conclude that novel insights will come from applying tri-trophic theory systematically across all levels of biological organisation.