Landscape constraints on plant functional connectivity as a multi-scale process

面对不断变化的全球气候和土地利用，植物需要能够在破碎的景观中移动，以保持遗传多样性并改变其范围。植物及其基因在景观中的移动（植物功能连接）主要通过授粉和种子传播进行。许多植物依靠多种动物媒介来运输花粉和种子，这些媒介可能以不同的方式对景观作出反应。尽管存在这种内在的复杂性，但植物功能连接通常被建模为单一的空间过程，这可能无法解释例如罕见的长距离扩散事件。******由于每种动物媒介对景观的反应都具有物种特异性和规模依赖性，因此景观变化对植物功能连通性以及最终植物种群生存能力的影响将取决于不同媒介表现出同步（可能加速植物功能连通性的丧失）或分化（可能缓冲植物功能连通性）的程度。计划研究的目的是将植物功能连通性描述为多个空间尺度上多个扩散过程的联合效应。******该研究项目将在我的空间生态与景观遗传学实验室培养4名博士生和21名本科生（通过本科生暑期研究助理奖学金、学士学位论文、研究机会计划）。以两个研究系统为重点，一个在加拿大，一个在哥斯达黎加，我们将使用生态和分子遗传学方法的结合。学生将被训练结合实地实验，观察研究和计算机模拟实验来评估景观变化通过改变传粉者和种子传播者的行为对植物功能连通性的净影响。******我们将通过进行景观尺度的基因流实验和解决营养相互作用，推动景观遗传学超越典型的单一物种观察研究的界限。在五年计划之后，这里开发和验证的人口-遗传模型将为在不断变化的景观中物种相互作用的背景下测试生态进化理论提供一个理想的机会。建立一个框架，了解全球变化的影响如何通过改变生物相互作用（如动物介导的授粉和种子传播）在生态系统中发生级联，对于在当今快速变化的景观中管理和维持生物多样性非常重要。

In the face of changing global climate and land use, plants need to be able to move across fragmented landscapes to maintain genetic diversity and to shift their ranges. The movement of plants and their genes across a landscape (plant functional connectivity) happens largely through pollination and seed dispersal. Many plants rely on multiple animal vectors to transport pollen and seeds, and these vectors may respond to the landscape in different ways. Despite this inherent complexity, plant functional connectivity is often modeled as a single spatial process, which may fail to explain e.g. rare long-distance dispersal events. ******As each animal vector responds to the landscape in a species-specific and scale-dependent way, the consequences of landscape change for plant functional connectivity, and ultimately plant population viability, will depend on the degree to which different vectors show synchronized (potentially accelerating the loss of plant functional connectivity) or divergent responses (potentially buffering plant functional connectivity). The planned research aims to characterize plant functional connectivity as the joint effect of multiple dispersal processes at multiple spatial scales.******This research program will train four Ph.D. students and 21 undergraduate students (through Undergraduate Summer Research Assistantships, B.Sc. theses, Research Opportunity Program) in my spatial ecology and landscape genetics lab. Focusing on two study systems, one in Canada and one in Costa Rica, we will use a combination of ecological and molecular genetic approaches. Students will be trained to combine field experiments, observational studies and computer simulation experiments to assess the net effects of landscape change on plant functional connectivity through modifying the behavior of pollinators and seed dispersers. ******We will push the boundaries of landscape genetics beyond typical observational studies of single species by conducting a landscape-scale gene flow experiment and addressing trophic interactions. Beyond the five-year program, the demographic-genetic model developed and validated here will provide an ideal opportunity for testing eco-evolutionary theory in the context of interacting species in changing landscapes. Developing a framework for understanding how the effects of global change cascade through ecosystems by altering biotic interactions, such as animal-mediated pollination and seed dispersal, is important for managing and maintaining biodiversity in today's rapidly changing landscapes.