Learning to adapt to an uncertain future: linking genes, trees, people and processes for more resilient treescapes (newLEAF)

这项提案针对的是主题3：英国应对全球变化的应变能力。逃生--我们的林地、森林、城市树木--对我们的环境、我们的健康和福祉以及我们通过大幅增加树木数量的计划过渡到零碳经济的能力至关重要。然而，气候变化和日益增加的病虫害风险前所未有地威胁着英国的树木。这种未来是不确定的，但我们知道，我们的逃生方式必须改变才能生存和茁壮成长。尽管我们可能认为树枝逃逸是永久的或固定的，但事实上，它们具有惊人的动态能力，并根据与人类寿命相关的时间尺度进行变化。事实上，阻止人口改变和适应的往往只是人类干预。例如，在允许不受控制的放牧的地方，很少或根本没有再生，没有机会让新的遗传多样性进入种群，也没有机会让种群适应。要想让树梢逃逸具有弹性，改变是必不可少的，但这可以采取多种形式--从低干预，允许再生，但几乎不采取其他行动，到生产林业等高度管理的情况，在这种情况下，可以故意选择部署特定的基因类型来跟踪环境变化。为了理解、适应和塑造树状突起的变化，我们必须首先了解树状突起在过去是如何变化的，然后量化它们在未来有多大的变化潜力，最后开发出将变化构建到我们的树状突起中的方法以及我们与它们互动的方式。这份提案概述了NewLeaf项目，该项目旨在评估各种选择，利用树种内广泛的自然遗传变异来跟上气候和生物(病虫害)环境的预期变化。首先，我们将学习英国过去100年的树木逃生管理经验，将有关政策和实践的历史信息与地面树木种群变化的数据结合起来，以了解在政策层面做出的选择与树体逃生弹性结果之间的联系。然后，我们将量化在英国关键树种中通过自然选择和人工选择可以实现的适应速度，重点是与预测环境的适应性以及对害虫和病原体的敏感性有关的特征。我们将比较自然更新和种植对与树木相关的生物群落的发展的影响，特别是具有中介风险的潜在真菌和昆虫媒介。我们将直接从实验工作中借鉴，设计包含性状变异数据的模型，并将评估如何在不同的组成、配置和不同的管理制度下，利用树种内部的适应性来生成多样化和动态的树枝，并内置跟踪环境变化的能力，即使这种变化是不确定的。我们将测试工具和策略，以将虫害和病原体的风险降至最低，特别是那些与景观中计划增加的树木数量相关的工具和策略，从我们的一组重点物种及其相关群落之间的相互作用中学习。与利益攸关方合作，我们将探索可以部署的社会和经济驱动因素，以影响格局的变化，学习英国历史上的环境政策及其结果，以及欧洲各地类似系统中的关键案例研究。一个特别的重点将是人们参与到不确定性、活力和变化的概念中，研究将科学和艺术结合在一起的新方法，并围绕这些概念创作新作品。将这个多元化和多学科的团队聚集在一起，我们将产生新的研究、指导、政策建议、艺术和基于科学的工具，这些工具将在英国未来的灾难中推进弹性事业。

This proposal addresses Theme 3: Resilience of UK Treescapes to global change.Treescapes - our woodlands, our forests, our urban trees - are critical to our environment, our health and well-being and our ability to transition to a zero carbon economy via plans to substantially increase tree numbers in the landscape. However, climate change and increasing risks from pests and disease threaten the UK treescape like never before. This future is uncertain but we do know that our treescapes must change to survive and thrive. Although we may see treescapes as permanent or fixed, in truth they have an amazing capacity to be dynamic and shift on timescales that are relevant to human lifespans. Indeed, it is often only human interventions that have prevented populations from changing and adapting. For example, where uncontrolled grazing is allowed, little or no regeneration occurs and there is no opportunity for new genetic diversity to enter the population and for the population to adapt. For treescapes to be resilient, change is essential, but this can take many forms - from low intervention, allowing regeneration but taking little other action, to highly managed situations like production forestry, where deliberate choices can be taken to deploy particular genotypes to track environmental shifts. To understand, live with and shape change within treescapes, we must first learn from how treescapes have changed in the past, then quantify how much potential they have to change in the future, and finally develop ways of building change into our treescapes and the ways we interact with them. This proposal outlines newLEAF, a project to evaluate options for using the extensive natural genetic variation within tree species to keep pace with expected changes in climate and the biotic (pest & disease) environment. Firstly, we will learn from the past 100 years of treescape management in the UK, bringing together historical information on policy and practice with data on changing tree populations on the ground to understand the link between choices made at a policy level and the outcomes for treescape resilience. Then we will quantify the rate of adaptation that can be achieved by both natural and human selection in key tree species for the UK, focusing on traits linked to fitness in forecasted environments and susceptibility to pests and pathogens. We will compare the impacts that natural regeneration versus planting has on the development of biotic communities associated with trees, particularly fungi and insect vectors with the potential to mediate risk. Drawing directly from the experimental work, we will design models incorporating data on trait variability and will evaluate how internal adaptability within tree species can be used, in varying compositions, configurations and under different management regimes, to generate diverse and dynamic treescapes with an in-built capability to track environmental changes, even when that change is uncertain. We will test tools and strategies to minimise risk from pests and pathogens, especially those associated with planned increases in tree numbers in the landscape, learning from the interactions between our set of focal species and their associated communities. Working with stakeholders, we will explore the social and economic drivers that can be deployed to effect change in the landscape, learning from historical environmental policies and their outcomes in the UK and from key case studies in similar systems across Europe. A particular focus will be on people engaging with the concepts of uncertainty, dynamism and change, studying new ways to integrate science and the arts and creating new works framed around these ideas. Bringing together this diverse and multidisciplinary team, we will produce new research, guidance, policy recommendations, art and science-based tools that will advance the cause of resilience in the UK's future treescape.