LTREB Renewal: Population and community ecology of desert winter annuals

该项目扩展了对沙漠植物种群的30年研究，以了解种群如何在短期环境变化和长期气候变化的情况下持续存在和共存。有关种子发芽、植物存活和繁殖的数据将继续收集，以确定种子是如何触发发芽的，以及何时或为什么发芽被推迟以利用不同的环境条件。这些决定在很大程度上导致了该群落植物丰度和物种共存的变化。实地测量将与实验相结合，以开发模型来探索种子“库”或未发芽种子的积累如何缓冲种群和群落免受短期和长期环境变化的影响。这些模型还将用于研究物种之间的差异如何促进它们的共存和物种多样性，并预测沙漠植物群落将如何应对新出现的气候条件。与人类群落一样，自然群落也受到环境变化和气候变化的挑战。这项研究将决定植物群落如何应对正常的环境变化，以及它们将如何应对更热、更干燥、更多变的环境。研究生和本科生将接受研究方面的实践培训，以补充正式课程。一些活动将扩大研究对公众、K-12学生和教师以及生态系统管理专业人员的影响。其中包括亚利桑那大学生物圈2号设施的教育亭，与亚利桑那STEM教师中心的协调，以及参与一个新的环境生物学中心，该中心汇集了来自美国西南部的土地管理者和大学科学家

This project extends a 30-year study of desert plant populations to understand how populations persist and coexist in the face of short-term environmental variation and long-term climate shifts. Data on seed germination, plant survival, and reproduction will continue to be collected to determine how seeds are triggered to germinate and when - or why - germination is delayed to take advantage of different environmental conditions. These decisions are largely responsible for changes in plant abundance and species coexistence in this community. Field measures will be combined with experiments to develop models to explore how seed 'banks,' or accumulations of ungerminated seeds, buffer populations and communities against short- and long-term environmental variation. These models will also be used to investigate how differences among species promote their coexistence and species diversity and to predict how desert plant communities will respond to emerging novel climatic conditions.Like human communities, natural communities are challenged by increasing environmental variation and shifting climate. This research will determine how plant communities cope with normal environmental variability and how they will respond to a hotter, drier, more variable environment. Graduate and undergraduate students will receive hands-on training in research that complements formal coursework. Several activities will extend the impact of the research to the public, K-12 students and teachers, and ecosystem management professionals. These include an educational kiosk at the University of Arizona's Biosphere 2 facility, coordination with the Arizona Center for STEM Teachers, and participation in a new Center for Environmental Biology that brings together land managers and university scientists from the southwestern U.S.