Dissertation Research: Pleistocene Impacts on the Evolution of Alpine Plant-insect Interactions

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Pleistocene Impacts on the Evolution of Alpine Plant-Insect InteractionsDeChaine, EG and AP MartinAbstract Communities may be ephemeral aggregations of species or may be stable, wherein members evolve in cohort over time. This study will infer the 'openness' of alpine plant-insect communities and the relative impact of biotic and abiotic factors on the evolution of interacting species. The history of alpine plant-insect communities of the Rocky Mountains will be inferred by comparative phylogeography of two specialized plant-insect associations. Phylogenies for each species will be constructed from genetic polymorphisms. Phylogenies will be compared within specialized plant-insect pairs as well as between unassociated organisms to infer the relative influence of biotic and abiotic factors. Preliminary analysis suggests that specialized plant-insect pairs share a common history and that the geographic structure of genetic diversity is due to historic fragmentation of the alpine followed by post-glacial range expansion. This study will reveal the relative importance of historic abiotic and biotic interactions on the composition of alpine plant-insect communities.