Age, development and limnology of extant Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau lakes: A reconstruction based on phylogeography and palaeoecology of the gastropod genus Radix

该项目旨在更好地了解现有青藏高原湖泊（中国）的年龄和动态。气候，构造和湖泊发展的相互作用已经研究了一些湖泊的作者，但是，到目前为止还没有尝试相互联系的地理和古环境的研究，以解开高原湖泊的演变在一个更广泛的空间和时间背景。这种方法是为了检验不同的假设，青藏高原湖泊的地质和湖沼历史。水栖腹足类属Radix是高原分布的极少数无脊椎动物类群，是新开发湖泊的第一批入侵者（例如，在冰川退缩之后），代表了进行研究的生物学和古生物学工具。将从总共26个湖泊系统中调查活的根和化石贝壳的种群。这些湖泊系统分布在青藏高原的大部分地区，处于不同的气候和构造环境中。根属植物主要遗传事件年表。将通过使用复杂的分子测年方法开发这些数据，然后将这些数据与高原的地质，湖沼和气候数据联系起来。研究的第二条途径是通过地球化学和形态测量手段建立Radix作为（古）环境代用指标。保存在化石贝壳中的环境信号将被用来推断过去的水文变化，通过校准化石信号与来自特征良好的栖息地的现存腹足类动物的信号。综合青藏高原的古地理和古环境数据，可以勾勒出特定的湖泊历史，这可以用来产生一个更全面的图片比迄今为止可能的青藏高原。

The project aims at a better understanding of age and dynamics of existing Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau lakes (China). The interplay of climate, tectonics and lake development has been studied by authors in respect to some lakes; however, so far no attempts have been made to interlink phylogeographical and paleoenvironmental studies in order to unravel the evolution of plateau lakes within a broader spatial and temporal context. Such an approach is proposed here in order to test different hypotheses concerning the geological and limnological history of Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau lakes. The aquatic ga-stropod genus Radix, which belongs to the very few plateau-wide distributed invertebrate taxa, and the first invaders of a newly developed lake (e.g., after the retreat of a glacier), represents the biologi-cal and paleontological vehicle for the studies to be conducted. Populations of living Radix as well as fossil shells will be investigated from a total of 26 lake systems. These lake systems are scattered over most of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, being located in different climatic and tectonic settings. A chronology of major genetic events in Radix spp. will be developed by using sophisticated molecular dating methods, and these data are then to be linked to geological, limnological, and climate data from the plateau. The second avenue of research is to establish Radix as a (paleo-) environmental proxy by geochemical and morphometrical means. The environmental signals preserved in fossil shells will be used to infer past hydrological changes by calibrating the fossil signals with signals from extant gastropods derived from well characterized habitats. Integration of phylogeographical and pa-leoenvironmental data will allow outlining specific lake histories, which can be used to generate a more general picture for the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau than hitherto possible.