Diatom Species Richness in Swiss Springs Increases with Habitat Complexity and Elevation

Understanding the drivers of species richness gradients is a central challenge of ecological and biodiversity research in freshwater science. Species richness along elevational gradients reveals a great variety of patterns. Here, we investigate elevational changes in species richness and turnover between microhabitats in near-natural spring habitats across Switzerland. Species richness was determined for 175 subsamples from 71 near-natural...