Multi-User Analytical Equipment for the Plant Ecology Program at UM-St. Louis

该提案要求为密苏里大学圣路易斯分校植物科学项目提供多用户分析设备的资金。 五名研究人员需要这种设备来加强他们目前的研究计划和未来的研究。 这些研究人员在植物种群遗传学，植物-食草动物相互作用和植物生活史领域工作。 这些不同领域的研究通过研究人员对确定影响植物发育，生长和繁殖成功的选择性环境因素的兴趣而获得共同的关注。 所要求的设备将为教师和学生提供资源，以研究植物资源分配的模式，植物对环境变化和压力的反应，水的关系，光合作用和次级化合物化学。 需要这种设备的具体研究项目包括：比较分析栎属物种在不同微生境中的资源分配和生长模式，评估山胡椒防御和耐草食动物抗性的基因型变异，记录热带森林冠层之间和密苏里州森林幼苗发育阶段之间的资源分配，肉质果实的资源可用性和普通林下食果蝙蝠和鸟类的同化效率，以及一枝黄花生殖成本的遗传基础的确定。 所要求的设备包括元素分析仪、荧光计和光合作用系统、水关系仪器、环境监测设备和计算机、植物生长箱、气相色谱仪和超低温冷冻机。

This proposal requests funds for multi-user analytical equipment for the University of Missouri-St. Louis plant sciences program. Five investigators require this equipment to enhance their current research programs and for future research. These researchers work in the areas of plant population genetics, plant-herbivore interactions, and plant life history. Research in these diverse areas gains a common focus through the investigators' interest in determining the selective environmental factors influencing plant development, growth, and reproductive success. The equipment requested would provide the resources for faculty and students to study patterns of plant resource allocation, plant responses to environmental variation and stress, water relations, photosynthesis, and secondary compound chemistry. Specific research projects requiring this equipment include: comparative analysis of resource allocation and growth patterns in different microhabitats in Quercus species, assessment of genotypic variation in Piper arieanum defense and tolerance resistance to herbivory, documentation of resource allocation across canopies of tropical forests and between developmental stages of seedlings in Missouri forests, resource availability in fleshy fruits and assimilation efficiencies for common understory fruit-eating bats and birds, and determination of the genetic basis of reproductive costs in Solidago. The requested equipment includes an elemental analyzer, a fluorometer and photosynthesis system, water relations instruments, environmental monitoring equipment and computer, plant growth chambers, a gas chromatograph, and an ultracold freezer.