Dissertation Research: Consequences of Habitat Fragmentation for Plant-Pollinator Interactions

摘要生态过程是全球努力维持生物多样性的关键。授粉是一个重要的生态过程，但广泛的生境碎片化正在扰乱世界各地本土植物与传粉者的相互作用，并威胁到本土群落的长期保护。栖息地碎片化减少了种群，最近的研究表明种群大小与植物繁殖成功之间存在正相关。主要的挑战是理解这种关联背后的机制。在拟议的工作中，将研究上述相关性的三个可能原因：1)传粉者吸引力降低可能会降低片段中的繁殖成功率，2)片段中传粉者多样性降低可能会增加传粉者的限制，3)较小的种群规模可能会导致更大的近亲繁殖(并伴随着近亲繁殖抑制)。这些机制将用观察和实验的方法来探索两个物种--粘性老爷草和大鳞海鞘。

AbstractEcological processes are key to global efforts to maintain biological diversity. Pollination is an essential ecological process, but widespread habitat fragmentation is disrupting native plant-pollinator interactions worldwide and threatens long-term conservation of native communities. Habitat fragmentation reduces populations, and recent studies have revealed a positive correlation between population size and plant reproductive success. The major challenge is to understand the mechanisms underlying this correlation. In the proposed work, three possible causes of the above correlation will be examined: 1) reduced pollinator attraction could lower reproductive success in fragments, 2) lower pollinator diversity in fragments may increase pollinator limitation, and 3) smaller population sizes may result in greater inbreeding (and concomitant inbreeding depression). These mechanisms will explored for two species, Geranium viscosissimum and Asclepias speciosa, using both observational and experimental approaches.