About the Authors

Chi Xu

xuchi@nju.edu.cn

Affiliations School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Xianlin Road 163, Nanjing, 210023, P.R. China, Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, NL-6700 AA, Wageningen, The Netherlands

Milena Holmgren

Affiliation Resource Ecology Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, NL-6700 AA, Wageningen, The Netherlands

Egbert H. Van Nes

Affiliation Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, NL-6700 AA, Wageningen, The Netherlands

Marina Hirota

Affiliation Department of Physics, Federal University of Santa Catarina, P.O. Box 476, 88040–970, Florianópolis, Brazil

F. Stuart Chapin III

Affiliation Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, Alaska, 99775, United States of America

Marten Scheffer

Affiliation Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, NL-6700 AA, Wageningen, The Netherlands

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: CX M. Holmgren EHVN M. Hirota FSC MS. Performed the experiments: CX. Analyzed the data: CX. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: CX EHVN M. Hirota. Wrote the paper: CX M. Holmgren EHVN M. Hirota FSC MS. Interpreted the results: CX M. Holmgren EHVN M. Hirota FSC MS.