Do closely related species interact with similar partners? Testing for phylogenetic signal in bipartite interaction networks

Whether interactions between species are conserved on evolutionary time-scales has spurred the development of both correlative and process-based approaches for testing phylogenetic signal in interspecific interactions: do closely related species interact with similar partners? Here we use simulations to test the statistical performances of the two approaches that are the most widely used in the field: Mantel tests and the Phylogenetic Bipartite Linear Model (PBLM). Mantel tests investigate the correlation between phylogenetic distances and dissimilarities in sets of interacting partners, while PBLM is a process-based approach that relies on strong assumptions about how interactions evolve. We find that PBLM often detects a phylogenetic signal when it should not. Simple Mantel tests instead have infrequent false positives and moderate statistical power; however, they often artifactually detect that closely related species interact with dissimilar partners. Partial Mantel tests, which are used to partial out the phylogenetic signal in the number of partners, actually fail at correcting for this confounding effect, and we instead recommend evaluating the significance of Mantel tests with network permutations constraining the number of partners. We also explore the ability of simple Mantel tests to analyze clade-specific phylogenetic signals. We provide general guidelines and an application on an interaction network between orchids and mycorrhizal fungi.