Conservation Biology faces the challenge of safeguarding the ecological processes that sustain biodiversity. Characterization and evaluation of these processes can be carried out through attributes or functional traits related, for example, to the exchanges of matter and energy between vegetation and the atmosphere. Nowadays, the use of satellite imagery provides useful methods to produce a spatially continuous characterization of ecosystem functioning and processes at regional scales. Our dataset characterizes the patterns of ecosystem functioning in the Sierra Nevada Biosphere Reserve (SE Spain) from the vegetation dynamics captured through the spectral vegetation index EVI (Enhanced Vegetation Index) since 2001 to 2018 (product MOD13Q1.006 from MODIS sensor). First, we provided three Ecosystem Functional Attributes (EFAs) (i.e., annual primary production, seasonality and phenology of carbon gains), as well as their integration into a synthetic mapping of Ecosystem Functional Types (EFTs). Second, we provided two measures of functional diversity, EFT richness and EFT rarity. Finally, to show which are the most stable and variable zones between year in terms of ecosystem functioning, we delivered the interannual variability in ecosystem functioning from two measures, EFTs interannual variability and EFTs interannual similarity. For each variable there are two groups of data (two subfolders): one containing the yearly variables, and another one containing the summaries for the 18-year period. The dataset provides the first characterizacion of the functional diversitiy at ecosystem level developed in the entire protected area.

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