Ecology and Evolution of Young Leaf Defenses in Tropical Rainforest Legumes

植物和食草动物构成了地球生物多样性的大部分，它们在进化上的相互作用导致了一场军备竞赛，植物的防御受到食草动物的反适应。 在热带森林中，绝大多数食草动物是由以嫩叶而不是成熟叶片为食的昆虫造成的，不同物种之间的损害差异很大，但我们对这种差异的根本原因知之甚少。 使用明确考虑相互作用的进化历史的方法，该项目将研究热带豆科植物幼叶的化学防御，并将其与其他植物防御，昆虫食草动物对叶片的损害以及食草动物的生活史特征相关联。 方法包括植物化学分析，与食草动物喂养试验，以评估毒性，和食草动物，叶片扩展的时间，和食草动物的饮食宽度的现场测量。 该项目将提高我们对植物和食草动物之间的生态和进化相互作用的总体理解，并将提供关于鲜为人知的热带森林的数据。 此外，所研究的植物具有商业价值（果实），可用于重新造林和增加土壤养分。

Plants and herbivores comprise the majority of the earth's biodiversity and their evolutionary interactions have resulted in an arms race in which plant defenses are met by counter adaptations on the part of herbivores. In tropical forests, the vast majority of herbivory occurs by insects feeding on young rather than mature leaves and there is enormous variation in damage among species, yet we know little of the underlying causes of this variation. Using an approach that explicitly considers the evolutionary history of the interaction, this project will examine the chemical defenses of young leaves of tropical legume trees, and correlate this with other plant defenses, with leaf damage by insect herbivores, and with herbivore life history traits. Methods include analyses of plant chemistry, feeding trials with herbivores to assess toxicity, and field measurement of herbivory, timing of leaf expansion, and diet breadth of herbivores. This project will improve our general understanding of the ecological and evolutionary interactions between plants and herbivores, and will provide data on poorly known tropical forests. In addition, the plants under study have commercial value (fruit), and are used for reforestation and for enriching soil nutrients.