Antropic disturbances and the seed dispersal service by primates: the case of the state of São Paulo

• Grant number: 17/08440-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): July 01, 2017
• Effective date (End): December 31, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Ecology - Applied Ecology
• Principal Investigator: Laurence Marianne Vincianne Culot
• Grantee: Lucas Augusto Pereira
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biociências (IB). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Rio Claro. Rio Claro , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 14/14739-0 - The effect of fragmentation on primate ecological functions, AP.JP

Abstract

The fragmentation and conversion of natural habitats into anthropogenic environments, together with the hunting pressure, are great threats to biodiversity. Your effects on organisms are usually assessed through species richness. However, the species richness does not expose the consequences of species loss to the functioning of ecosystems and, in this sense, functional diversity measures are necessary. In tropical forests, primates account for 25 to 40% of frugivorous biomass, playing an important role as seed dispersers and maintaining biodiversity. The Atlantic Forest is a highly fragmented biome with a high diversity of primates. In this sense, this project aims to evaluate how habitat fragmentation, landscape heterogeneity and hunting pressure affects the species richness and seed dispersal service offered by primates in forest remnants in the Atlantic Forest of the state of São Paulo, Brazil. To do so, a database of primate communities in the state of São Paulo will be set up, as well as their functional atributes linked to the dispersion of seeds, based on data collected from the specialized literature. Then, we will calculate the functional diversity indexes and determine the level of hunting in the remnants analyzed as well the landscape metrics of fragment area, mean isolation of fragments, functional connectivity, predominant type of matrix, matrix permeability and distance to the nearest urban area. We expect that species richness and functional diversity to similarly decline when related to anthropogenic disturbances, and that habitat loss and fragmentation has more influence than hunting pressure on both species richness and functional diversity of primates. (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)

MARJAKANGAS, EMMA-LIINA; ABREGO, NEREA; GROTAN, VIDAR; DE LIMA, RENATO A. F.; BELLO, CAROLINA; BOVENDORP, RICARDO S.; CULOT, LAURENCE; HASUI, ERICA; LIMA, FERNANDO; MUYLAERT, RENATA LARA; et al. Fragmented tropical forests lose mutualistic plant-animal interactions. DIVERSITY AND DISTRIBUTIONS, v. 26, n. 2, NOV 2019. (14/18800-6, 14/14739-0, 13/08722-5, 17/08440-0, 14/01986-0, 13/25441-0, 17/21816-0, 15/17739-4, 17/09676-8, 13/50421-2)