Trait-mediated effects of ants on arthropods: From individuals to communities

蚂蚁对节肢动物的性状介导的影响：从个体到群落

• 批准号: 314743975
• 负责人: Dr. Laia Mestre
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Umweltwissenschaften
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Grants
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2015-12-31 至 2019-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/314743975?language=en
• 关键词: Trait; mediated; effects; ants; arthropods

Trait-mediated effects (TME) are predator-induced changes in prey phenotype that minimize predation risk. While the impact of TME on predator-prey interactions can be stronger than predation, our understanding of their role in structuring communities is still limited. This is due to a striking lack of TME research on intraguild interactions and in terrestrial systems, an overriding focus on isolated species pairs rather on multi-species interactions, and a general disregard for the involved chemical mechanisms. The aim of the project is to close three important gaps in this fundamental area of ecological research.In the first objective, we will perform behavioural trials with ant cues to document the occurrence of ant TME across a wide range of spider species in order to identify species with strong antipredator behavior and to test the influence of spider foraging mode on TME strength. The second objective focuses on the chemical mechanisms of TME: different ant chemical cues have contrasting decay rates, more volatile pheromones signaling currently active foraging areas and non-volatile hydrocarbons indicating ant home range We will extract different ant cues and do behavioural trials with spiders to identify their role in TME magnitude. In the third objective, we will use the strongest TME-inducing ant cue to examine the context-dependence of TME and their indirect effects on the food web. We will experimentally evaluate how ant TME are influenced by food availability to spiders and their previous experience of predation risk, and how this interplay leads to cascading consequences for the lower trophic levels of the arthropod food web. The proposal takes an integrative approach that joins the concepts of behavioural, chemical and community ecology and addresses neglected topics that are crucial to a mechanistic understanding of TME in species interactions.

特征介导效应（Trait-mediated effects，TME）是指捕食者诱导的猎物表型变化，使捕食风险最小化。虽然TME对捕食者-猎物相互作用的影响可能比捕食更强，但我们对它们在构建社区中的作用的理解仍然有限。这是由于TME研究intraguild相互作用和陆地系统中，一个压倒一切的重点是孤立的物种对，而不是多物种的相互作用，以及普遍忽视所涉及的化学机制。该项目的目标是填补生态学研究这一基本领域的三个重要空白。第一个目标是，我们将利用蚂蚁线索进行行为试验，记录蚂蚁TME在广泛的蜘蛛物种中的发生，以确定具有强烈反捕食行为的物种，并测试蜘蛛觅食模式对TME强度的影响。第二个目标集中在TME的化学机制：不同的蚂蚁化学线索有对比的衰减率，更挥发性的信息素信号目前活跃的觅食区和非挥发性的碳氢化合物指示蚂蚁的家范围我们将提取不同的蚂蚁线索，并与蜘蛛做行为试验，以确定它们在TME的大小的作用。在第三个目标中，我们将使用最强的TME诱导蚂蚁线索，研究TME的上下文依赖性及其对食物网的间接影响。我们将通过实验评估蚂蚁TME是如何影响蜘蛛和他们以前的经验，捕食风险的食物供应，以及这种相互作用如何导致级联后果的节肢动物食物网的营养水平较低。该提案采取了一种综合方法，将行为，化学和社区生态学的概念结合起来，并解决了被忽视的主题，这些主题对物种相互作用中TME的机械理解至关重要。