Identifying knowledge gaps in hypersaline systems supporting the global electrical transition: invertebrate community structure in salars from the lithium triangle

Following decades of mining impacts, South America's hypersaline wetlands (salars) face increasing threats from lithium extraction to support global decarbonisation. Although globally important, salars are understudied and information needed to understand environmental impacts is lacking. Modern ecological studies on salars have focused on microbial community composition and function but other taxa are less studied, including resident and migratory reptiles and birds and their aquatic invertebrate prey. Given the scale and immediate nature of the threats associated with lithium exploitation, we must deepen our understanding of salar biology, but this is impeded by logistic/financial restrictions given the heightened costs of sampling in these often remote, extreme environments. Given the pressing demand for information, we collated/analysed information from the literature. We generated lists of invertebrate taxa present in 63 hypersaline environments from Argentina, Bolivia, Chile and Peru, and examined relationships between invertebrate community structure and physicochemical factors. We recorded 46 different taxa, with the Centropagidae being the most frequently recorded taxon across systems. Multivariate analyses of community structure showed significant clustering among sites. Variation in community structure was best explained by maximum salinity (18%). Geographical location or ecosystem size had no obvious effect on community structure. We provide a useful broad view of aquatic invertebrate diversity in the hypersaline salars but highlight the general lack of information regarding the ecology of these ecosystems.