Cascading Temporal, Spatial and Metabolomic Drivers of Tropical Seedling Community Structure and Dynamics

This dataset supports the study "Cascading Temporal, Spatial and Metabolomic Drivers of Tropical Seedling Community Structure and Dynamics." It includes 16 years (2008–2023) of quarterly seedling recruitment and survival data from a hyperdiverse tropical rainforest in Xishuangbanna, China, covering 47 tree species and 23,714 individual seedlings. The data also comprise untargeted leaf metabolomic profiles for these species, with annotations for major chemical classes (e.g., alkaloids, terpenoids).

Metrics for temporal recruitment covariation (inter- and intra-annual), spatial conspecific/heterospecific encounter rates, and neighborhood model outputs for seedling survival are provided. The dataset facilitates analysis of how temporal, spatial, density-dependent, and phytochemical mechanisms jointly promote species coexistence in tropical forests.