Collaborative Research: LTREB RENEWAL - Long-term studies of flowering, fruiting and seedling recruitment in Neotropical forests: global change, climate variability and mechanisms

热带森林植物的开花、种子生产和幼苗的建立在时间和空间上都有很大的差异，这使得热带森林具有丰富的多样性。这项长期研究量化了波多黎各、厄瓜多尔和巴拿马三个气候差异很大的新热带森林的这种变化。在每个地点使用相同的方法，全年将监测开花和种子生产，并在定期绘制和测量所有树木的大片永久地块内每年测量苗木建立。高分辨率条形码系统发育和对成虫和幼虫功能特征的完整测量将为当前的生态学研究增加一个进化的视角。所产生的数据将用于检验与自然气候周期或人为全球变化有关的年际变化假设，并评估繁殖和建立过程中的时空变化对热带森林多样性的重要性。了解热带植物的再生具有基础和应用上的重要性；热带森林约占植物物种多样性的60%，植物生产力的35%，陆地植物碳库的25%。从这项研究中获得的有关繁殖和早期更新的长期、定量数据将有助于确定植物繁殖与气候变化之间的关系，并预测长期趋势。数据和相关分析是可公开获取的。至少25名本科生和研究生，包括几名拉美裔学生，将在波多黎各大学和南伊利诺伊大学接受培训，加州大学戴维斯分校的一名博士后助理的职业发展将得到促进。

Flowering, seed production, and seedling establishment of tropical forest plants vary tremendously in time and space, contributing to the rich diversity that characterizes tropical forests. This long-term study quantifies this variation in three Neotropical forests in Puerto Rico, Ecuador, and Panama that vary dramatically in climate. Using identical methods at each site, flowering and seed production will be monitored throughout the year and seedling establishment measured annually within large permanent plots where all trees are mapped and measured regularly. High resolution bar code phylogenies and complete measurements of adult and seedling functional traits will add an evolutionary perspective to the current ecological study. The resulting data will be used to test hypotheses relating interannual variation to natural climate cycles or to anthropogenic global change, and to evaluate the importance of spatio-temporal variation in reproduction and establishment to tropical forest diversity. Understanding tropical plant regeneration is of fundamental and applied importance; tropical forests account for approximately 60% of plant species diversity, 35% of plant productivity, and 25% of plant carbon stores on land. The long-term, quantitative data on reproduction and early regeneration from this study will enable identification of relationships between plant reproduction and climate variation, and prediction of long-term trends. Data and associated analyses are publicly accessible. At least 25 undergraduates and graduate students, including several Hispanics, will receive training at the University of Puerto Rico and Southern Illinois University, and the career progression of one post-doctoral associate from the University California, Davis, will be facilitated.