Research on the conservation-area model for maintenance of biodiversity and its use

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This research project aimed to build up the conservation-area model for the maintenance of biodiversity and its use, and conducted two pilot field-studies in Yakushima Island and Lake Biwa combining with the theoretical studies.In the field station at Yakushima Island, we observed the dynamics of leaves and shoots of trees from the bottom of forest to the top of crown, and evaluated the role of vertical and horizontal structures of trees in forest. These studies suggest that the architechture of forest might be produced by the inter-individual interaction among trees, and the more complicate structure maintains the more high diversity of species.In Lake Biwa, we investigated the offshore and inshore bio-community of the lake. The studies reveal that the large-scale environmental structure produced by the large-body organisms such as submerged plant and the small-scale environmental structure including the microbial-loop of nutrients among the micro-organisms are the important ecological factors to maintain the high diversity in the aquatic communities. In addition, the biodiversity might depend on the heterogeneity in the offshore due to the physical characteristics of viscous fluid (freshwater) , and also the environmental fluctuation in the inshore due to the inflow of nutrient after the rain, though these environmental factors maintain the bio-community with different ecological phases.Thus, in addition to the time-scale and space-scale heterogeneities in the physical environment, the environmental heterogeneity produced by the oraganisms themselves should promote the creation and/or the maintenance of higher biodiversity, irrespective of the land or aquiatic ecosystems, and of temperate or torpical areas. And hence, the consevation-area for higher biodiversity should include the environment for interactive organisms to function the ecologically chained system.