Collaboration

Notes on representing collaboration and co-design with nonhuman beings.

Core framing: Agent, Agency, Biological Individuality, Niche
Design methods anchor: Approaches to Designing, Interspecies Design, Multispecies Design
Governance and regulation lens: Personhood, Governance, Rights, Law
Cell and organism scales: Cell, Microbe, Fungi, Animals
Population, species, and movement: Eel, Birds, Migration, Habitat
Habitat and ecosystem engineering: Oyster, Scanning and Modelling, Tree, Moss, Soil, Water
Planetary and off-world context: Planetary, Earth, Life, Astrobiology, Space Exploration

Types of Agents

Design can collaborate with more than species. For more, see: Biological Individuality

A species name helps locate a being within taxonomy and conservation systems. However, actual design relations often occur at other levels.

For example:

A single animal may use or reject an artificial habitat.
A local population may depend on movement corridors.
A colony may build, filter or stabilise a substrate.
A holobiont may survive through microbial relations that remain invisible at the species level.
A guild may provide a service such as pollination, decomposition or hollow use.
A habitat system may support many taxa without belonging to one species.
An ecosystem may act through linked flows of water, nutrients, shade, shelter, disturbance and reproduction.

Collaboration Networks

The design relation matters as much as the taxonomic position.

Individual	Signal (action or trace)	Contribution	Intervention
Anguillid eels	Migration routes, passage refusal, burrowing traces	Reveal connectivity gaps, redistribute nutrients, reshape substrate	Redesign fish passages, protect migratory corridors, monitor eel-led indicators
Australian flat oyster (Ostrea angasi)	Settlement density, recruit survival, reef accretion	Build reef substrate, filter water, create habitat for other species	Iterative redesign of reef modules, placement, and surface complexity
Blue-banded bee (Amegilla cingulata)	Visitation and nesting activity	Pollination and persistence in urban ecologies	Reconfigurable habitat structures and floral resource planning
Arboreal termites (Nasutitermes walkeri)	Nest geometry and material performance	Demonstrate lightweight, thermally stable habitat construction logics	Biomimetic design rules for fabricated habitat structures
Oyster mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus)	Mycelial growth pattern, binding quality, decay dynamics	Provide bio-based structural material and decomposition capacity	Grow mycelium-bound prosthetic nests, tune substrate and curing protocols
Large old trees (for example Eucalyptus, ash, oak)	Hollow formation, canopy form, branch architecture	Provide long-term shelter, microclimate buffering, and habitat scaffolds	Laser-scan and model host trees, graft prosthetic hollows where needed
Cavity-nesting birds (for example tits, sparrows, owls)	Occupancy, nest modification, reproductive success	Evaluate habitat suitability and set practical design criteria	Compare nest types, adjust geometry and thermal performance across iterations
Moss communities (bryophytes)	Surface colonisation, moisture retention, particulate capture	Regulate microclimate, support near-surface biodiversity	Design porous substrates and near-surface ecologies for establishment at scale

Other Possible Contributions (Services)

Seed dispersal and assisted regeneration.
Pest suppression and trophic regulation.
Water filtration and nutrient retention.
Sediment stabilisation and shoreline protection.
Carbon storage and long-term biomass accumulation.
Heat buffering and urban cooling.
Hydrological moderation (infiltration, interception, flow delay).
Soil formation and porosity improvement.
Biogeochemical cycling (nitrogen, phosphorus, silica).
Bioindication of disturbance, toxicity, drought, and disease.
Material innovation through growth-based fabrication.
Cultural and pedagogical services (place attachment, multispecies learning).

Possible Interventions for Future Mapping

Habitat corridor repair across fragmented sites.
Seasonal resource mosaics (flowers, shelter, moisture, substrate).
Multi-species shelter gradients instead of single-species units.
Substrate palettes tuned to colonisation succession.
Adaptive placement protocols based on occupancy feedback.
Disturbance refugia and microclimate patches.
Co-monitoring protocols combining sensor and field observation traces.
Exclusion and access controls to reduce harmful overlap.
Managed decomposition zones for nutrient cycling and habitat.
Policy and maintenance triggers linked to nonhuman signals.
Co-design governance rules with explicit nonhuman thresholds.

Named Frameworks for Tables, Matrices, Diagrams, and Categories

Framework	Purpose	Intended use by authors and current users	Output form and typical artefact	Possible future splits or investigation lines
Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services (CICES) v5.1 1	Standardise contribution categories	Environmental accounting and policy teams use it to classify ecosystem services consistently across assessments	Category schema: hierarchical classification table	Split by biome and urban vs regional contexts; test category fit for multispecies design cases
Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Nature's Contributions to People (NCP)2	Capture plural values of nature	IPBES authors, assessment panels, and biodiversity planners use it to include diverse value systems in evaluations	Category schema: value-category matrix	Split by stakeholder groups; compare Indigenous-led and policy-led value frames
Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR)3	Structure intervention logic	Environmental agencies and indicator programmes use it to link pressures, states, impacts, and policy responses	Causal framework: chain table or flow diagram	Add temporal scales (event, seasonal, decadal); test alternative response pathways
Rights of Nature and legal personhood for nature4	Establish legal standing for ecosystems or species collectives	Legislatures, courts, and guardianship bodies use it to represent rivers, forests, and ecosystems as rights-holders	Governance and regulation framework: rights-holder registry and guardian mandate model	Compare guardian designs; track enforceability, remedies, and ecological outcomes across jurisdictions
Ecological Network Frameworks5	Represent interaction structure	Ecologists use it to model trophic and non-trophic interactions and infer stability and function	Interaction taxonomy: interaction matrix	Separate trophic and facilitation layers; investigate seasonal rewiring of interactions
Leopold Matrix6	Score intervention effects systematically	Environmental impact assessors use it to score project actions against environmental components	Impact matrix: action by component scoring grid	Split direct and indirect effects; add confidence and reversibility scoring dimensions
Ecosystem Engineering Typology7^,8	Distinguish mechanism of environmental change	Ecology researchers use it to classify biotic physical modifications and evaluate ecosystem-level consequences	Mechanism categorisation: autogenic vs allogenic matrix	Split engineering intensity classes; compare engineered habitat longevity and spillover effects

Templates to Reuse

Template	Framework base	Minimal columns or fields
Contributor x Service matrix	CICES + NCP	Collaborator, service class, evidence signal, confidence, scale
Intervention x Impact matrix	Leopold Matrix + DPSIR	Intervention, pressure change, state variable, impact, response metric
Socio-ecological adjacency matrix	Social-Ecological Network Analysis	Node A, relation type, Node B, strength, evidence source
Niche construction coding table	NCT + ecosystem engineering	Actor, modification, inceptive/counteractive, autogenic/allogenic, inheritance pathway
Site suitability scoring table	GIS-MCDA	Site, criterion, weight, score, weighted total, decision

Examples

Socio-ecological systems.9

"Panarchy" is the term we use to describe a concept that explains the evolving nature of complex adaptive systems. Panarchy is the hierarchical structure in which systems of nature (for example, forests, grasslands, lakes, rivers, and seas), and humans (for example, structures of governance, settlements, and cultures), as well as combined human-nature systems (for example, agencies that control natural resource use) and social-ecological systems (for in- stance, co-evolved systems of management), are interlinked in never-ending adaptive cycles of growth, accumulation, restructuring, and renewal.10

Legal rights for rivers.4

Leopold Matrix for scoring environmental impact.6

Data Sources

Open Tree of Life: synthetic phylogeny, taxonomy alignment, lineage context. Has API and supports a variety of visualisation tools.
NCBI Taxonomy: curated taxon identifiers, names, and hierarchy.
GBIF: species pages, occurrence records, distribution evidence.
Catalogue of Life: accepted names, synonyms, and taxonomic backbone.

Visualisation Options

Tree of Life (Cladogram or Radial Tree)

Shows where collaborators sit across evolutionary and taxonomic relationships.

Useful for:

demonstrating taxonomic diversity
revealing representation across major branches of life
situating collaborators within broader evolutionary history

Examples:

eel
fairywren
oyster
eucalyptus
fungus
soil bacteria

Levels of Individuality Diagram

Shows the biological scale at which collaboration occurs.

Useful for:

moving beyond species-centric thinking
identifying meaningful units of action and response
comparing collaborations across scales

Levels:

cell
organism
colony
symbiotic association
holobiont
population
species
guild
community
ecosystem
biome
biosphere
earth system and solar-terrestrial context

Examples:

organism: individual eel
colony: oyster reef
holobiont: tree and microbiome
community: soil microbiome
ecosystem: wetland

Bipartite Collaboration Network

Links collaborators to projects, actions or design interventions.

Useful for:

revealing which collaborators participate in multiple projects
identifying shared ecological functions
mapping interactions rather than taxonomy

Examples:

eel population → fish passage design
oyster colony → reef restoration
hollow-using guild → artificial habitat design

Matrix or Heatmap

Shows the presence and strength of relationships.

Useful for:

comparing many collaborators simultaneously
revealing clusters and gaps
supporting detailed analysis

Rows:

collaborators

Columns:

projects
habitats
ecological functions
design relations

Multilayer Network

Combines taxonomy, biological individuality and design relations.

Useful for:

representing collaboration as a socio-ecological system
linking evolutionary, ecological and project data
understanding nonhuman participation at multiple scales

Layers:

taxonomic identity
biological individuality
ecological functions
projects
sites

Notes

Footnotes

Haines-Young, Roy H. Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services: Guidance on the Application of the Revised Structure. 5.2. Barton in Fabis: European Environment Agency (EEA), 2023. https://cices.eu/resources/.˄
Díaz, Sandra, Unai Pascual, Marie Stenseke, Berta Martín-López, Robert T. Watson, Zsolt Molnár, Rosemary Hill, Kai M. A. Chan, Ivar A. Baste, and Kate A. Brauman. “Assessing Nature’s Contributions to People.” Science 359, no. 6373 (2018): 270–72. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aap8826.˄
Carnohan, Shane A., Xenia Trier, Suxia Liu, Lauge P. W. Clausen, Jai K. Clifford-Holmes, Steffen F. Hansen, Lorenzo Benini, and Ursula S. McKnight. “Next Generation Application of DPSIR for Sustainable Policy Implementation.” Current Research in Environmental Sustainability 5 (2023): 100201. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crsust.2022.100201. (Used by the European Environment Agency and in United States Environmental Protection Agency Office of Research and Development (ORD) research programmes.)˄
O’Donnell, Erin L., and Julia Talbot-Jones. “Creating Legal Rights for Rivers: Lessons from Australia, New Zealand, and India.” Ecology and Society 23, no. 1 (2018): art7. https://doi.org/10.5751/es-09854-230107.˄
Ings, Thomas C., José M. Montoya, Jordi Bascompte, Nico Blüthgen, Lee Brown, Carsten F. Dormann, François Edwards, et al. “Review: Ecological Networks—beyond Food Webs.” Journal of Animal Ecology 78, no. 1 (2009): 253–69. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2656.2008.01460.x.˄
Leopold, Luna Bergere, Frank Eldridge Clarke, Bruce B. Hanshaw, and James R. Balsley. A Procedure for Evaluating Environmental Impact. Circular No. 645. US Geological Survey, 1971. https://doi.org/10.3133/cir645.˄
Jones, Clive G., John H. Lawton, and Moshe Shachak. “Organisms as Ecosystem Engineers.” In Ecosystem Management: Selected Readings, edited by Fred B. Samson and Fritz L. Knopf, 130–47. New York: Springer, 1996.˄
Jones, Clive G., John H. Lawton, and Moshe Shachak. “Positive and Negative Effects of Organisms as Physical Ecosystem Engineers.” Ecology 78, no. 7 (1997): 1946–57. https://doi.org/10.1890/0012-9658(1997)078%255B1946:PANEOO%255D2.0.CO;2.˄
Ostrom, Elinor. “A General Framework for Analyzing Sustainability of Social-Ecological Systems.” Science 325, no. 5939 (2009): 419–22. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1172133.˄
Holling, C. S. “Understanding the Complexity of Economic, Ecological, and Social Systems.” Ecosystems 4, no. 5 (2001): 390–405. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10021-001-0101-5.˄