A Conceptual and Mechanistic Approach to Understanding Interactions among Multiple Disturbance Agents: Compound Effects of Fire on Resource Availability to Bark Beetles

树皮甲虫是对森林生态系统产生巨大影响的本地昆虫。这些因素包括对基本生态系统过程的贡献，如养分循环和间隙形成，对生物多样性的影响，以及有时导致数百万棵树的普遍死亡。间歇性树皮甲虫爆发的频率和程度似乎受到多种人类影响的影响，包括气候变化、森林破碎化和各种管理政策。本研究将使用地面采样，树木生理和生化分析，卫星图像，以评估影响的一个主要形式的自然和人为干扰，火灾，对小火炬松的易感性山松甲虫，山松甲虫繁殖。它还将测试火灾如何影响其他与山松甲虫竞争的非树木杀手树皮甲虫的繁殖。这项工作将有助于我们的基本了解如何干扰剂在针叶林相互作用，并提供有用的信息资源管理人员。它将通过培训本科生、研究生和博士后助理来促进科学基础设施。这项跨学科研究将在大黄石生态系统中进行，在那里它将与来自不同机构的其他合作者进行交流。

Bark beetles are native insects that exert dramatic effects on forest ecosystems. These include contributions to basic ecosystem processes such as nutrient cycling and gap formation, impacts on biodiversity, and, at times, widespread mortality to millions of trees. The frequency and extent of intermittent bark beetle outbreaks appear to be influenced by several human impacts, including climate change, forest fragmentation, and various management policies. This research will use ground sampling, tree physiological and biochemical analyses, and satellite imagery to evaluate the effects of a major form of natural and human disturbance, fire, on susceptibility of lodgepole pine to the mountain pine beetle, and on mountain pine beetle reproduction. It also will test how fire injury affects reproduction by other, non tree-killing bark beetles that compete with mountain pine beetle. This work will contribute to our basic understanding of how disturbance agents interact in conifer forests, and provide useful information for resource managers. It will contribute to science infrastructure through the training of undergraduate students, graduate students, and postdoctoral associates. This interdisciplinary study will be conducted in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, where it will interface with other collaborators from various institutions.