OPUS: Integrating long-term demographic data, field experiments, and mathematical models to understand mangrove forest dynamics

这项研究项目将综合对加勒比海沿着红树林的种群和群落生态进行25年实地调查的结果。红树林是世界各地热带和亚热带海岸的主要植被类型。它们支持多样化、高产的食物网，并提供宝贵的生态系统服务，如渔业物种的育苗栖息地、候鸟的越冬栖息地、保护海岸线免受风暴潮的影响以及地下储存大量碳。尽管这些生态系统具有相当大的价值，但红树林生境受到沿海开发、污染和转为水产养殖的严重威胁。该研究项目的一个中心目标是提高我们预测红树林生态系统对自然和人为干扰的反应的能力;这一知识将有助于指导恢复这些极具价值的生态系统的努力。为实现这一目标，将通过分析长期实验和观测研究的数据以及森林动态数学模型的预测，查明这些生态系统反应的一般机制。关于这些系统丰富的生物学信息，以及该地区的这一研究和类似研究的结果将与其他生态学家，他们的学生和业余博物学家在一本由PI撰写的关于新热带红树林生态学的书中分享。该项目还将涉及本科生助理，以维持研究人员长期致力于培训年轻科学家并指导他们从事科学事业的承诺，该研究的第一阶段将完成对控制研究森林结构和动态的因素的长期观察和实验实地调查数据的综合分析。通过监测1993年建立的六个森林地块中单独标记的树木的命运，记录了森林人口和组成。这些观测数据的补充，两个长期的实地实验，在1995年和1999年开始，测试的独立和相互作用的影响，竞争和草食动物的光隙再生和空间分布的物种沿着潮汐梯度。这些分析的结果将合成一个空间上明确的模型，红树林森林动态，参数化树木人口数据收集的森林地块和实地实验。模型模拟将预测一系列环境情景下森林组成和年龄/空间结构的变化。该项目的最后阶段将致力于设计和编写一本关于新热带红树林群落生态的插图书。这将是该地区的第一次。本书将重点介绍这些系统丰富的生物学特性以及塑造其结构和动态的关键生态过程，同时将突出红树林生态系统所面临的严峻环境，并讨论其保护和可持续管理的方法。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This research project will integrate the results of a 25-yr field investigation of the population and community ecology of mangrove forests along the Caribbean coast. Mangroves are a predominant vegetation type of tropical and subtropical coasts around the world. They support diverse, highly productive food webs, and provide valuable ecosystem services such as nursery habitat for fishery species, wintering habitat for migratory birds, protection of coastlines from storm surge, and below-ground storage of large stocks of carbon. Despite the considerable value of these ecosystems, mangrove habitats are severely threatened by coastal development, pollution, and conversion to aquaculture. A central goal of this research project is to enhance our ability to predict the responses of mangrove ecosystems to both natural and human-caused disturbances; this knowledge will help guide efforts to restore these highly valuable ecosystems. This goal will be achieved by identifying general mechanisms underlying these ecosystem responses through analyses of data from long-term experimental and observational studies, and from the predictions of a mathematical model of forest dynamics. Information about the rich biology of these systems, and the findings of this and similar studies in the region will be shared with other ecologists, their students, and amateur naturalists in a PI-authored book on the ecology of neotropical mangrove forest communities. This project will also involve undergraduate student assistants, maintaining the investigator's long commitment to training young scientists and guiding them to careers in science.The first phase of this research will complete comprehensive analyses of data from long-term observational and experimental field investigations of the factors that control the structure and dynamics of the study forests. Forest demography and composition have been documented by monitoring the fates of individually marked trees in six forests plots that were established in 1993. These observational data are complemented by two long-term field experiments, initiated in 1995 and 1999, that test the independent and interactive effects of competition and herbivory on light gap regeneration and the spatial distributions of species along the tidal gradient. The results of these analyses will be synthesized with a spatially-explicit model of mangrove forest dynamics, parameterized with tree demographic data collected from the forest plots and field experiments. Model simulations will predict changes in forest composition and age/spatial structure under a range of environmental scenarios. The final phase of the project will be devoted to designing and writing a photo-illustrated book on the ecology of neotropical mangrove forest communities. It will be the first of its kind for the region. While focusing on the rich biology of these systems and key ecological processes that shape their structure and dynamics, the book will highlight the dire circumstances faced by mangrove ecosystems and discuss approaches to their protection and sustainable management.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.