How does habitat complexity affect amphipod dispersal? A test using seagrass and bryozoans

• Grant number: 16/23206-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Post-doctor
• Effective date (Start): June 30, 2017
• Effective date (End): June 29, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Ecology - Applied Ecology
• Principal Investigator: Fosca Pedini Pereira Leite
• Grantee: Marília Bueno Fernandes
• Supervisor: Scott Burgess
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biologia (IB). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Research place: Florida State University, United States
• Associated to the scholarship: 15/10797-9 - Effects of lifestyle and size on initial dispersal and recruitment on amphipods (Crustacea: Gammaridea), BP.PD

Abstract

Predation pressure is intense in shallow marine environments and finding suitable shelters may enhance survival for marine invertebrates, in a way that more complex habitats may provide better refuges when compared to simpler structures. Amphipods undergo direct development and disperse to new habitats as juveniles or adults for feeding and/or hiding from visually-oriented fishes. In order to investigate if habitat complexity affects dispersal patterns in amphipod assemblages inhabiting seagrass beds, two morphologically distinct bryozoans associated to seagrass will add increasing complexity to seagrass blades. Stylopoma sp. is a flat encrusting bryozoan which associated to seagrass will render a more complex habitat when compared to seagrass alone but a less complex habitat when compared to Bugula neritina attached to seagrass blades, which is an erect arborescent bryozoan. We will focus on herbivorous amphipods in order to eliminate the use of the experimental habitat for feeding, once herbivorous amphipods do not feed on seagrass or bryozoans. By deploying manipulated patches at different distances from the seagrass bed, we expect that distance directly affects dispersal in a way that at longer distances amphipods colonize exclusively better-quality habitats. (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)

BURGESS, SCOTT C.; BUENO, MARILIA. When does growth rate influence fitness in a colonial marine invertebrate?. Marine Biology, v. 168, n. 1, JAN 2021. (16/23206-1)

BURGESS, SCOTT C.; POWELL, JACKSON; BUENO, MARILIA. Dispersal, kin aggregation, and the fitness consequences of not spreading sibling larvae. ECOLOGY, v. 104, n. 1, p. 15-pg., 2022-10-27. (16/23206-1)

BURGESS, SCOTT C.; SANDER, LISA; BUENO, MARILIA. How relatedness between mates influences reproductive success: An experimental analysis of self-fertilization and biparental inbreeding in a marine bryozoan. ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTION, v. 9, n. 19, p. 11353-11366, OCT 2019. (16/23206-1)