Scaling up from local plant - plant and plant-soil relationships to landscape level patterns of diversity and process

我的研究计划调查植物-植物和植物-土壤相互作用如何构建植物和土壤群落的多样性和组成。我获得这笔赠款的目的是：1)研究局部尺度的植物-微生物关系如何与大规模的非生物和气候因素相互作用，以构建植物和土壤微生物群落的景观格局；2)理清细微尺度植物生根模式背后的机制，特别是土壤养分异质性和植物根系竞争的作用。*植物-植物和植物-土壤的相互作用基本上是局部的，发生在毫米到厘米的尺度上。这些细微尺度的过程得到了很好的研究，但人们对它们如何影响植物群落和土壤群落中的大尺度格局知之甚少。扩大到景观是具有挑战性的，因为许多相互作用的生态机制需要评估。我建议将当地尺度的直接植物-土壤关系与群落模式和过程联系起来，范围从当地植物群落、中等尺度因素(如草食和地形)，以及景观尺度因素(如气候和土壤母质)。空间结构方程建模将使我能够评估机制的相对强度和重要性如何在不同范围内变化。这将使我能够理清中到大尺度的因素，如环境条件和景观历史，如何与精细的生物相互作用来构建群落。通过表征广泛的气候和土壤梯度上植物根和土壤微生物群之间的局部多营养关系，我将研究众所周知的植物根-微生物联系如何构建植物和土壤群落多样性和组成的广泛模式。最后，我将通过研究细微尺度土壤条件如何影响个体植物的生根模式，通过实验研究这些关系是如何反馈给个体植物的。*我将利用一个多尺度的实地调查计划来表征1000平方公里本土草原地区的植物和土壤真细菌、古生菌和真菌群落。采样将遵循空间显式设计，以捕捉从单个植物-土壤相互作用(&lt；25厘米)到土壤母质和气候影响(1-100公里)的过程。博士学位。学生将研究景观尺度因素如何与精细尺度的植物-土壤关系相互作用，以构建植物和土壤群落组成。理科硕士。学生将专注于当地和景观层面的因素如何影响植物根的多样性和根的放置模式。最后，第二个理学硕士将研究驱动细微尺度植物生根模式的潜在机制的选择，包括土壤肥力、土壤养分异质性和竞争植物根的作用。学生。**

My research program investigates how plant-plant and plant-soil interactions structure plant and soil community diversity and composition. My objectives for this grant are to 1) investigate how local-scale plant-microbial relationships interact with large scale abiotic and climate factors to structure landscape-level patterns in plant and soil microbial communities, and 2) to disentangle the mechanisms underlying fine-scale plant rooting patterns, particularly the roles of soil nutrient heterogeneity and plant root competition.***Plant-plant and plant-soil interactions are fundamentally local, occurring at scales of millimetres to centimetres. These fine-scale processes are well studied, yet comparatively little is known about how they influence broad-scale patterns in plant and soil communities. Scaling up to landscapes is challenging because many interacting ecological mechanisms need to be assessed. I propose to link the local scale of direct plant-soil relationships to community patterns and processes at scales ranging from the local plant community, mid-scale factors such as herbivory and topography, and landscape-scale factors such as climate and soil parent material. Spatial structural equation modeling will allow me to evaluate how the relative strength and importance of mechanisms changes across scale. This will allow me to disentangle how medium to larger scale factors such as environmental conditions and landscape history interact with fine scale biological interactions to structure communities. Through characterizing the local-scale multitrophic relationships between plant roots and soil microbiota across broad climatic and soil gradients, I will examine how the well understood plant root-microbe linkages structure broad-scale patterns of plant and soil community diversity and composition. Finally, I will experimentally examine how these relationships feed back to individual plants by examining how the rooting patterns of individual plants are affected by fine-scale soil conditions.***I will utilize a multi-scale field survey program to characterize the plant and soil eubacteria, archaea, and fungal communities across a 1000 km2 region of native prairie. Sampling will follow a spatially explicit design to capture process ranging from individual plant-soil interactions (<25cm) to soil parent material and climate effects (1-100km). A PhD. student will investigate how landscape-scale factors interact with fine scale plant-soil relationships to structure plant and soil community composition. An MSc. student will focus on how local and landscape-level factors influence patterns of plant root diversity and root placement. Finally, a selection of potential mechanisms driving fine-scale plant rooting patterns including the role of soil fertility, soil nutrient heterogeneity, and competing plant roots will be investigated by a second MSc. student.**