2024-11-28
Phylogenetic conservatism in the relationship between functional and demographic characteristics in Amazon tree taxa
Publication
Publication
Functional Ecology , Volume 39 - Issue 1 p. 181- 198
1. Leaf and wood functional traits of trees are related to growth, reproduction, andsurvival, but the degree of phylogenetic conservatism in these relationships islargely unknown. In this study, we describe the variability of strategies involvingleaf, wood and demographic characteristics for tree genera distributed across theAmazon Region, and quantify phylogenetic signal for the characteristics and theirrelationships.2. Leaf and wood traits are aligned with demographic variables along two main axesof variation. The first axis represents the coordination of leaf traits describingresource uptake and use, wood density, seed mass, and survival. The second axisrepresents the coordination between size and growth. Both axes show strongphylogenetic signal, suggesting a constrained evolution influenced by ancestralvalues, yet the second axis also has an additional, substantial portion of its vari-ation that is driven by functional correlations unrelated to phylogeny, suggestingsimultaneously higher evolutionary lability and coordination.3. Synthesis. Our results suggest that life history strategies of tropical trees are gen-erally phylogenetically conserved, but that tree lineages may have some capa-bility of responding to environmental changes by modulating their growth andsize. Overall, we provide the largest-scale synopsis of functional characteristicsof Amazonian trees, showing substantial nuance in the evolutionary patterns ofindividual characteristics and their relationships.
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doi.org/10.1111/1365-2435.14700 | |
Functional Ecology | |
Released under the CC-BY 4.0 ("Attribution 4.0 International") License | |
Organisation | Staff publications |
Sanchez‐Martinez, Pablo, Dexter, Kyle G., Draper, Freddie C., Baraloto, Chris, Leão do Amaral, Iêda, de Souza Coelho, Luiz, … ter Steege, H. (2024). Phylogenetic conservatism in the relationship between functional and demographic characteristics in Amazon tree taxa. Functional Ecology, 39(1), 181–198. doi:10.1111/1365-2435.14700 |