In biological and ecological statistical inference，it is practically useful to provide a lower bound for species richness. Chao（1984. 1989) derived a non-paramctric lower bound for species richness in a single community. However，there have been no lower bounds proposed in the literature for the number of species shared by multiple communities. Based on sample abundance or replicated incidence（i.e.. presence or absence) records of each observed species，we propose in this paper a non-parametric lower bound for shared species richness in multiple communities The lower bound is valid for all types of species abundance distributions. Simulation results are reported to examine the performance of the proposed lower bound. Replicated incidence data of ciliates species collected in three areas from Namibia. Southwest Africa，are used for illustration. The new statistical tools suggest that at（east 40% of shared species were not registered in these studies. This information regarding the extent of underxampling would be useful for microbial diversity research.
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