Ecosystem services associated with aquatic plants in urban landscapes

本项目将重点关注水生植物群落与城市环境之间的关系。具体而言，该项目将涉及两个关键主题。1)城市环境对水生植物分布和功能生态的影响城市水生植物的分布是由扩散和生境水平的过程共同决定的：一个物种能否到达一个新的地点，一旦到达就能建立起来？关于城市水生植物分布的生态位/中性过程的理论将使用英国城市池塘植物群落的广泛数据集进行测试。具体的假设将被测试，包括：(i)城市地点的生物同质化，（ii）城市社区更强的空间结构，（iii）以及在陆地生态系统中观察到的城市化与植物物种丰富度之间的驼峰关系。这些分析可以通过纳入功能性植物性状来扩展，以研究城市水体中的功能多样性和冗余。2)水生植物在提供城市生态系统（dis）服务中的机制作用城市水生植物通过增强生物多样性、城市径流的植物修复和改善当地美学做出了积极贡献，也通过它们作为入侵物种（如新西兰矮草）或滋扰物种（如有毒藻华）的作用做出了消极贡献。

This project will focus on the relationships between aquatic plant communities and the urban environment. Specifically, this project will address two key topics.1) Influence of urban environment of aquatic plant distribution and functional ecologyUrban aquatic plant distributions are determined by a combination of dispersal and habitat-level processes: can a species reach a new site, and can it establish once arrived? Theories about the niche/neutral processes underlying urban aquatic plant distributions will be tested using an extensive dataset of UK urban pond plant communities. Specific hypotheses will be tested, including: (i) biotic homogenisation of urban sites, (ii) stronger spatial structuring of communities in cities, (iii) and the hump-backed relationship between urbanisation and plant species richness observed in terrestrial ecosystems. These analyses can be expanded by incorporating functional plant traits to investigate functional diversity and redundancy within urban waterbodies. 2) Mechanistic role of aquatic plants in the delivery of urban ecosystem (dis)servicesUrban aquatic plants contribute both positively, through the enhancement of biodiversity, the phytoremediation of urban run-off, and the improvement of local aesthetics, as well as negatively, through their role as invasive species (e.g. New Zealand pigmy weed) or nuisance species (e.g. toxic algal blooms).