How Landscape Connectivity and Heterogeneity Affect Wind Dispersal

扩散，或移动的生物体，其繁殖体，或其基因远离其来源，是一个至关重要的过程，并越来越受到生态学和保护生物学的关注，景观和生物体的移动路径被人类活动改变，如栖息地丧失和破碎化。空气和水的流动以及景观的结构模式可以相互作用，影响孢子、花粉、种子、幼虫和昆虫等被动生物的传播轨迹。对于风传播的种子，风速是传播距离的最重要的决定因素，这可以改变景观结构。因此，人为引起的当地景观结构变化（例如，生境破碎化）可能导致物理流动和扩散轨迹的变化。了解景观结构异质性如何改变栖息地的空间分布和它如何影响动态流将是至关重要的理解和预测人为引起的景观变化如何影响被动分散繁殖体的扩散。研究人员建议测试如何景观结构异质性改变风传播的种子的轨迹，在南卡罗来纳州的萨凡纳河网站使用一个受控的实验景观。在补丁，不同的连接和补丁形状的风动力学将被量化，并用于参数化模型预测风传播的种子。然后将对该模型进行实验验证。这项研究将帮助保护生物学家确定在经历全球变化（包括栖息地破碎化和气候变化）的异质景观中植物的适当保护行动。

Dispersal, or the movement of organisms, their propagules, or their genes away from their source, is a critically important process and is increasingly receiving attention in ecology and conservation biology as landscapes and the movement pathways of organisms are altered by human activities such as habitat loss and fragmentation. The flow of air and water and the structural pattern of the landscape can interact to affect the dispersal trajectory of passive organisms like spores, pollen, seeds, larvae, and insects. For wind-dispersed seeds, wind velocity is the most important determinant of dispersal distance, which can be altered by landscape structure. Therefore, human-induced changes in local landscape structure (e.g., by habitat fragmentation) may lead to shifts in physical flows and dispersal trajectories. Understanding how landscape structural heterogeneity alters both the spatial distribution of habitat and how it affects dynamic flows will be critical for understanding and predicting how human-induced landscape changes affect the dispersal of passively-dispersed propagules. The investigator proposes to test how landscape structural heterogeneity alters the trajectory of wind-dispersed seeds using a controlled experimental landscape at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Wind dynamics in patches that differ in their connectivity and patch shape will be quantified and used to parameterize a model predicting the wind-dispersal of seeds. This model will then be experimentally validated. The research will help conservation biologists determine appropriate conservation actions for plants in heterogeneous landscapes undergoing global change, including habitat fragmentation and climate change.