Dissertation Research: Impacts of Biological Diversity on Sediment Transport Conditions in Streams

论文研究：生物多样性对河流中沉积物输送条件的影响

• 批准号: 1110571
• 负责人: Bradley Cardinale
• 金额: $ 1.5万
• 依托单位: University of California-Santa Barbara
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-06-01 至 2013-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1110571&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Dissertation; Research; Impacts; Biological; Diversity

Many fields of natural science suggest that organisms both respond to and also directly regulate the physical processes that structure ecosystems, in ways that have major implications for how the current loss of Earth?s biodiversity will affect our planet. A growing number of studies incorporates the influence of organisms into our understanding of biogeochemical cycles, functioning of ecosystems, and formation of habitats. Most of these studies still consider the influence of only one species at a time, ignoring the diverse array of species that might have unique impacts. The project proposed here will explicitly ask how interactions between coexisting species influence the physical process of erosion. In this project, caddisfly (Trichoptera: Hydropsychidae) diversity in experimental streams will be manipulated. Caddisflies are one of the most diverse and widespread groups of insects that live in riverbeds. They construct silken nets across pore spaces between rocks to filter feed, and previous studies have shown that nets from a single species reduce sediment motion during floods. This study will test whether multiple species of caddisfly that coexist in the same stream cause a synergistic decrease in sediment motion compared to any single species alone. Predicting sediment transport has become increasingly important in light of land-use changes, altered flow regimes, and channel-restoration efforts, and this work will help develop a better understanding of one of the most important processes in ecology and geology. Although many researchers have shown that a single biological species can have a substantial impact on abiotic processes, few studies have mechanistically explored how multiple species of animals can synergistically regulate fundamental transport processes in streams. This approach will refine our ability to quantitatively predict erosion.

自然科学的许多领域表明，生物体既响应又直接调节结构生态系统的物理过程，其方式对目前地球的损失有重大影响。生物多样性将影响我们的地球。越来越多的研究将生物体的影响纳入我们对地球化学循环、生态系统功能和栖息地形成的理解。这些研究中的大多数仍然只考虑一个物种的影响，忽略了可能具有独特影响的各种物种。这里提出的项目将明确询问共存物种之间的相互作用如何影响侵蚀的物理过程。在这个项目中，石蛾（毛翅目：Hydropsychidae）的多样性在实验流将被操纵。石蛾是生活在河床中的最多样化和最广泛的昆虫群体之一。他们在岩石之间的孔隙中建造丝网来过滤饲料，以前的研究表明，单一物种的网可以减少洪水期间的沉积物运动。这项研究将测试是否多个物种的石蛾，共存于同一条河流中造成协同减少泥沙运动相比，任何单一的物种。根据土地利用的变化、水流状态的改变和河道恢复的努力，预测泥沙输运变得越来越重要，这项工作将有助于更好地了解生态学和地质学中最重要的过程之一。虽然许多研究人员已经表明，一个单一的生物物种可以有一个非生物过程的重大影响，很少有研究探讨了如何多个物种的动物可以协同调节河流中的基本运输过程。这种方法将改进我们定量预测侵蚀的能力。