What is the importance of integrating different diversity metrics to understand community structure and to substantiate conservation approaches for amphibian communities in the Brazilian biomes?

Author(s)

Lilian Sayuri Ouchi de Melo

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: São José do Rio Preto. 2018-08-15.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp). Instituto de Biociências Letras e Ciências Exatas. São José do Rio Preto
• Defense date: 2018-07-31
• Advisor: Denise de Cerqueira Rossa Feres; Thiago Gonçalves Souza

Abstract

Currently, ecological studies have been expanded their approach in order to discuss patterns and process that encompass community ecology, macroecology, and biogeography. Moreover, directing theoretical knowledge into biological conservation strategies is increasingly notable. Thus, in this thesis we seek to: i. briefly reviewing the community ecology biggest landmarks, ii. investigate how the different dimensions of diversity have been studied, iii. elucidate how community ecology theories are integrated to macroecology, biogeography, and conservation. In the first chapter, our main aim was to select priority areas for conservation based on anurans taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity in in the Brazilian Cerrado savanna, a biome widely threatened by the expansion of soybean production. In the second chapter, we ought to elucidate the main climatic (current and past), geological and energetic (e.g., productivity) factors, responsible for the distribution of the taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity of anurans in the three largest Brazilian biomes, the Amazon, the Cerrado and the Atlantic Forest. In the first chapter, our results revealed four areas of greater conservation interest in the Cerrado that had not been elucidated solely by species richness. This result indicates that selecting priority areas for conservation in the Cerrado based solely on traditional diversity metrics, such as species richness and endemism, that ignore the uniqueness of each species is not the most appropriate strategy. munBesides traditional metrics not being able to identify evolutionary patterns, they also do not ensure community persistence in the long term and, they do not allow us to make predictions about functional consequence of environmental changes. In the second chapter, we verified that each type of domain (forest or savanna) has its own dynamics in the generation and maintenance of the three diversity dimension, which seems to reflect a more evident environmental gradient in forested areas and greater environmental heterogeneity due to the habitat mosaics present in the Cerrado. Forested domains (Amazon and Atlantic Rainforest) have presented greater influence of climatic stability and relief heterogeneity, while the Cerrado savanna had no predominant pattern, with both variables influencing in different degrees each one of the diversity dimensions analyzed. So, each type of domain has its own dynamic to generate and maintain the different forms of biodiversity, from taxonomic to functional and phylogenetic diversity. In this way, understanding the peculiarities of forests and savannas around the world might envision new insights and generalizations about diversity dimensions. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 13/26101-8 - What is the importance of integrating several diversity metrics for understanding the function and structure of the amphibian tadpole communities in brasilian biomes?
• Grantee: Lilian Sayuri Ouchi de Melo
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate