DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Pitcher Plants: A Window into Metacommunity Processes

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Ecologists understand many of the processes that control plant and animal diversity. However, they are only beginning to understand microbial diversity. This study will explore processes common to microbes and larger organisms. The group Fungi is well suited to this role because it includes yeasts (as small as many bacteria), large forest mushrooms (estimated to rival blue whales in size), and all sizes in between. This project focuses on yeasts living in the leaves of carnivorous plants. It will quantify yeast biodiversity at several spatial scales, and will investigate both competition between yeasts and dispersal of individual yeasts as mechanisms that control diversity. Because yeasts are microscopic, they are expected to have a wide range of dispersal abilities; different dispersal abilities may result in a range of competitive abilities. In addition to using new technologies to explore biodiversity in nature, yeasts will be manipulated experimentally in microcosms. This research promises both to connect microbial ecology to plant and animal ecology and to reveal many processes contributing to microbial biodiversity. This project will have broader impacts on the community through connections with students, educators, and the public at large. It supports the work of one graduate student researcher, and will also include undergraduates and local public school teachers. In addition, results will be presented to both the local scientific public, the local lay public, and local youth through the course of the project.