Support for the Gordon Research Conference on the Chemistry of Plant-Herbivore Interactions to be held January 1, 1995, in Oxnard, California

该提案为将于1995年1月在加利福尼亚州奥克斯纳德举行的第六届戈登植物-草食动物相互作用化学会议寻求资金。本次会议的重点将是对植物-草食动物相互作用研究的方向进行批判性评估，以及确定这一分支学科中关键的突出问题。此外，本次会议的一个主要目标将是确定植物-食草动物系统是否以及如何有助于化学、行为、生理学和生态学等更大学科的概念概括。会议计划旨在促进几个特定主题的讨论：1)是否有一个连贯的，一般的概念框架来理解植物和食草动物之间的化学相互作用？试图构建这样一个框架是可取的吗？2)是否有一些普遍的原则可以跨越分类群和环境，适用于许多（如果不是大多数的话）植草食系统？或者每个系统都必须作为一个特例来研究？3)该领域需要解决的未解决的重要概念问题和未解决的问题是什么？4)草食植物系统的研究如何促进化学、生理学、行为学、生态学和进化等主要学科的概念进步？这次会议的时机很理想。植物-食草动物相互作用的研究现在正处于一个收集了大量数据的阶段，现在是时候退后一步进行综合了。该分支学科对每年因病虫害而遭受巨大经济损失的作物系统的管理有重要贡献。对这门学科的化学基础有更清晰的了解，可以带来更生态的有害生物管理形式

#9420502 Rauscher This proposal seeks funding for the sixth Gordon Conference on the Chemistry of Plant-Herbivore Interactions to be held in January 1995 in Oxnard, California. The focus of this conference will be a critical assessment of the directions in which the study of Plant-Herbivore Interactions is heading, as well as identification of the crucial outstanding problems in this subdiscipline. In addition, a major goal of this conference will be to determine if and how plant-herbivore systems can contribute to conceptual generalizations in larger disciplines such as chemistry, behavior, physiology and ecology. The conference program is designed to facilitate discussion of several specific topics: 1) Is there a coherent, general conceptual framework for understanding chemical interactions between plants and herbivores? Is attempting to construct such a framework desirable? 2) Are there general principles that cut across taxa and environments and apply to many, if not most, plant-herbivore systems? Or must each system be studied as a special case? 3) What are the important unresolved conceptual issues and unsolved problems that need to be addressed in this field? 4) How can the study of plant-herbivore systems contribute to conceptual advancement of major disciplines such as chemistry, physiology, behavior, ecology, and evolution? %%% The timing of this conference is ideal. The study of plant-herbivore interactions is now in a stage where vast amounts of data have been collected and it is now time to step back and synthesize. This subdiscipline has important contributions to make on management of crop systems which annually suffer huge economic losses to pests. Clearer understanding of the chemical underpinnings of the discipline can lead to more ecological forms of pest management