栖息地毁坏是物种多样性减少的首要因素之一，因此研究物种演化对栖息地毁坏的响应是非常必要的。而栖息地的毁坏又有瞬间毁坏和持续毁坏两种，以往对栖息地毁坏的研究集中在瞬间毁坏上，而该文则是通过N-物种竞争共存模型分析对比了物种演化对栖息地瞬间毁坏和持续毁坏的响应特征。研究发现：不同性质的栖息地毁坏都会导致物种强弱关系的变化，并非如通常所认为的强物种将免于遭受物种灭绝的威胁，也不是强物种首先灭绝，而是因集合种群结构的不同而异。在热带雨林群落，瞬间毁坏下物种演化一般经历了强迫适应和恢复上升阶段，而持续毁坏下物种得不到恢复，只能持续衰退，在较长一段时间内持续毁坏比瞬间毁坏更有利于物种的续存；而在温带森林群落，瞬间毁坏下物种演化一般经历强迫适应，恢复上升和准周期振荡，最后平衡，而持续毁坏下物种只能持续衰退，出现了在栖息地持续毁坏率小于瞬间毁坏率时，物种的栖息地占有率却小于瞬间毁坏时的占有率。
Habitat degradation is one of the leading causes of biodiversity losses, and there is an urgency to understand species responses to human-caused habitat degradation. Habitat degradation includes long-term sustained degradation and instantaneous destruction. Previous studies have focused primarily on the rapid or instantaneous destruction of habitats; therefore, in this paper, we compared species responses to the two different kinds of habitat degradation using an N-species competitive coexistence model. The results showed that both types of habitat degradation altered competitive relationships among strong and weak species. Our results showed that species extinctions were determined by the meta-population structure, which is in contrast to the common holding view that superior species are able to avoid extinction. In the case of instantaneous habitat destruction of a tropical forest, species pass through a phase of adaptation and then a phase of recovery; in contrast, sustained habitat degradation causes species to decay successively without recovery. Sustained habitat degradation is more propitious to species persistence over the long term as compared to instantaneous habitat destruction. Instantaneous habitat destruction of temperate forests cause species to pass through an adaptation phase, a phase of recovery, and then the population oscillates quasi-periodically at an equilibrium level through time; in contrast, sustained habitat degradation leads to species declines without recovery. Our results showed that species respond very differently to the two types of habitat degradation with species abundances declining more in gradual, sustained habitat degradation as compared to the instantaneous destruction of habitats.