DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Phylogenetic community ecology and diversification of hyperoliid frogs in the Afrotropics

论文研究：非洲热带地区高油青蛙的系统发育群落生态学和多样化

• 批准号: 1311006
• 负责人: Jimmy McGuire
• 金额: $ 2.03万
• 依托单位: University of California-Berkeley
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2013-05-01 至 2015-04-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1311006&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: DISSERTATION; RESEARCH; Phylogenetic; community; ecology

The lowland rainforests and montane forests of Africa are rich with biodiversity, but little is known about the ecological processes that have produced this high diversity. There is considerable debate about whether these different forest habitats are generating or maintaining diversity, and what ecological factors limit the number of species found in a given area. It has been proposed that the historically stable lowland rainforests of West Africa act to sustain old diversity, whereas the environmentally fluctuating montane forests of East Africa promote speciation and the generation of new diversity. This project tests that hypothesis using Hyperoliid frogs, which are Africa?s most diverse frog family, exhibiting the highest species richness in forested regions. The research will examine the factors promoting diversity by studying the number of species of hyperoliid frogs found in a given forest community, quantifying how ecologically similar those species are to one another, and determining the evolutionary relationships and ages of the species in the community. Comparing hyperoliid frog communities distributed across similar biogeographic regions as well across different kinds of forests, such as high elevation mountain forests and lowland rainforests, can uncover large-scale patterns of diversification in tropical Africa.Frogs have been used as indicator species, whose presence or absence in an environment provides an assessment of the environmental integrity. The threat of large-scale deforestation is immediate for most African countries, and habitat alteration will negatively impact the large numbers of forest dwelling species. By characterizing communities of hyperoliid frogs in different biogeographic regions in Africa, this study will establish a baseline for future monitoring and conservation efforts. Large-scale research across many African countries is both logistically and financially demanding, and therefore it is critical to establish and facilitate interactions within the community of researchers working in Africa. This project is the result of a major collaborative effort among over 22 researchers working in research institutions or universities located in the US, Europe, and Africa, and brings together a diverse group of researchers that will facilitate future cooperative efforts on similar projects.

非洲的低地雨林和蒙塔尼森林具有丰富的生物多样性，但对产生这种高度多样性的生态过程知之甚少。关于这些不同的森林栖息地是在产生或维持多样性，以及哪些生态因素限制了给定区域中发现的物种数量，存在很大的争论。有人提出，西非历史上稳定的低地雨林是为了维持旧的多样性，而环境上波动的东非森林则促进了物种形成和新的多样性。该项目检验了使用高酚类青蛙的假设，这些假设是非洲最多样化的青蛙家族，在森林地区表现出最高的物种丰富度。该研究将通过研究在给定森林群落中发现的高醇蛙种的数量来研究促进多样性的因素，从而量化了这些物种在生态上相似的彼此之间的相似之处，并确定了社区中该物种的进化关系和年龄。 比较分布在类似的生物地理区域的高叶蛙群落以及各种森林（例如高海拔山区森林和低地雨林）之间的比较，可以发现热带非洲的大规模多样化模式。群已经用作指示物种，它们在环境中的存在或不存在，可提供环境整合的评估。 对于大多数非洲国家而言，大规模森林砍伐的威胁是直接的，栖息地的改变将对大量森林住宅物种产生负面影响。 通过表征非洲不同生物地理区域中高酚类青蛙的社区，这项研究将建立一个未来监测和保护工作的基准。 许多非洲国家的大规模研究在逻辑和财务上都是要求的，因此在非洲工作的研究人员社区内建立和促进互动至关重要。 该项目是22位在美国，欧洲和非洲的研究机构或大学工作的研究人员中进行的主要合作努力的结果，并汇集了一群多样化的研究人员，这些研究人员将促进未来的合作努力。