Effects of predators, diversity and subsidies on the food web structure and ecosystem attributes: an intra and inter-ecosystem approach

• Grant number: 10/51636-4
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: January 01, 2011
• End date: June 30, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Ecology - Theoretical Ecology
• Principal Investigator: Gustavo Quevedo Romero
• Grantee: Gustavo Quevedo Romero
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biologia (IB). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This is a large multidisciplinary project, which will involve work groups, including researchers from Brazil and abroad, as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students. Here I will test the effects of multiple predators, and interactions between them, as well as autochthonous and allochthonous subsidies, on the structure of arthropod communities, food web dynamics and ecosystem processes such as decomposition, nutrient cycling and herbivory. Understanding how communities interact with ecosystems and how ecosystems affect each other are to date central themes of ecology. Many processes are relatively well known within each ecosystem. In contrast, little is known which elements of communities (e.g., predators, scavengers with complex life cycles) connect ecosystems (e.g., aquatic-terrestrial) and influence each other. Therefore, experimental studies proposed here will investigate intra-and inter-ecosystem attributes by using analytical and modem isotopic tools. In an intra-ecosystem approach, I will test the effects of autochthonous resources, such as plant debris, animal feces and fleshy fruits accumulated in the soil of forests on the structure of food webs and herbivory. In a cross-ecosystem approach I will investigate interactive effects of organisms, especially predators, as well as allochthonous subsidies (animal feces, debris) from a certain ecosystem on the community structure, food web dynamics and ecosystem attributes of neighbouring ecosystems. The systems to be investigated include mainly rain forests, cerrados, phytotelmata (bromeliads), and streams in forests. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

GONCALVES-SOUZA, THIAGO; ROMERO, GUSTAVO Q.; COTTENIE, KARL. Metacommunity versus Biogeography: A Case Study of Two Groups of Neotropical Vegetation-Dwelling Arthropods. PLoS One, v. 9, n. 12, DEC 30 2014. (10/51636-4)

VIEIRA, CAMILA; ROMERO, GUSTAVO Q.. Ecosystem engineers on plants: indirect facilitation of arthropod communities by leaf-rollers at different scales. ECOLOGY, v. 94, n. 7, p. 1510-1518, JUL 2013. (10/51636-4)

GONCALVES, ANA Z.; HOFFMANN, FERNANDO L.; MERCIER, HELENICE; MAZZAFERA, PAULO; ROMERO, GUSTAVO Q.. Phyllosphere Bacteria Improve Animal Contribution to Plant Nutrition. Biotropica, v. 46, n. 2, p. 170-174, MAR 2014. (10/51636-4, 11/10137-8)