LTREB Renewal: Long-Term Studies of Seedling and Small Sapling Community Dynamics in a Neotropical Forest

热带森林拥有地球上最多样化的植物群落。数百个相似的物种如何共存，而没有几个优势物种胜过所有其他物种，这是生态学中一个悬而未决的主要问题。进程发生在树的早期？人类的生命被认为是允许如此大量物种共存的关键。该项目扩展了一项为期12年的研究，该研究通过对巴拿马巴罗科罗拉多岛低地热带森林的幼苗和树苗的长期测量，检验了解释植物物种共存的多种假设。350种乔木、灌木和木本藤本植物的10万多株幼苗的命运将在绘制的森林盘存图中得到跟踪。热带森林提供了人类赖以生存的关键生态系统服务，但正在以惊人的速度消失。这项研究的结果将有助于预测和减轻全球变化对森林及其关键生态系统服务的影响。收集到的关于数百种热带植物更新需求的数据将有助于造林、森林管理和生物多样性保护。该项目促进国际科学合作，并为本科生、研究生和早期职业生物学家提供培训和就业机会。

Tropical forests possess the most diverse plant communities on earth. How hundreds of similar species can coexist, without a few dominant species outcompeting all others, is a major unresolved question in ecology. Processes occurring early in a tree?s life are thought to be critical for allowing such large numbers of species to coexist. This project extends a twelve-year study that tests multiple hypotheses proposed to explain plant species coexistence through long-term measurements of seedlings and saplings in lowland tropical forest on Barro Colorado Island, Panama. The fate of over 100,000 seedlings of 350 tree, shrub and woody vine species will be followed within a mapped forest inventory plot.Tropical forests provide critical ecosystem services upon which humans depend, but nonetheless are being lost at an alarming rate. Results from this study will help to predict and to mitigate the effects of global change on forests and their critical ecosystem services. Data collected on regeneration requirements for hundreds of tropical plant species will be useful in silviculture, forest management and biodiversity conservation. The project promotes international scientific collaboration and provides training and jobs for undergraduate and graduate students and early career biologists.