The Evolution of Ecological Stability and its Impact on Ecosystem Resilience and Adaptive Potential

由于气候变化、营养循环减少和其他多种影响，全球水生生态系统正面临大范围的破坏。食物网模型预测营养水平的“营养放大”效应。这将导致系统不稳定以及生态系统结构和生产力的变化。生态系统将如何改变取决于它们的生态和进化反应，以及它们的进化历史。建模表明，生态系统本质上应该是生态不稳定的，但理论和经验证据表明，生态系统进化是为了系统水平的稳定。一种进化机制是谨慎捕食，捕食者进化它们的攻击率以匹配猎物的携带能力。谨慎捕食已经在简单的模型中得到了证明，但复杂的水生食物网中出现的谨慎程度还不够清楚。已知的是审慎的进化强烈依赖于非生物环境，因此环境历史会影响系统稳定性的进化，从而对环境变化的韧性产生深远的影响。然后，环境变化可能会阻止未来系统稳定性的演变。反过来，通过微调物种相互作用的系统稳定性的演变也可能影响和限制生态系统的适应潜力。该项目将调查水生食物网中谨慎的进化和其他进化机制如何控制整个生态系统的功能和对变化的反应。

Aquatic ecosystems globally are facing wide-scale disruption due to climate change, reduced nutrient cycling and a plethora of other effects. Food web models predict 'trophic amplification' of effects up trophic levels. This will cause system destabilisation and changes in ecosystem structure and productivity. How ecosystems will change dependson their ecological and evolutionary responses, and their evolutionary history. Modelling suggests ecosystems should be intrinsically ecologically unstable, but theoretical and empirical evidence show ecosystems evolve for system-level stability. One evolutionary mechanism is prudent predation, where predators evolve their attack rates to match the carrying capacity of their prey. Prudent predation has been demonstrated in simple models, but the extent prudence emerges in complex aquatic food webs is insufficiently understood. What is known is evolution of prudence depends strongly on the abiotic environment, so environmental history affects evolution of system stability, so could have profound effects on resilience to environmental change. Environmental change could then preventfuture evolution of system stability. In turn, evolution of system stability through fine-tuning species interactions could also affect and constrain the adaptive potential of ecosystems. This project will investigate how evolution of prudence and other evolutionary mechanisms in aquatic food webs control whole-ecosystem functioning and responses to change.