Pollinators in a warming world
Temperature is one of the most important abiotic drivers of ecological communities and determines not only species composition but also physiological, morphological, and behavioral traits. Shifts in temperature regime, including the increasing occurrence and severity of heat waves are some of the most detrimental effects of climate change. This is particularly concerning for pollinating insects, given their well-documented decline and their pivotal role in both natural and managed ecosystems. Pollinators are among the most important components of terrestrial ecosystems and in addition to their intrinsic value, they also provide tremendous economic benefits. For example, ~80% of all flowering plants depend on pollinators for their reproduction, of which over 30% are crop species. In California alone, the economic worth of pollinator-dependent crops, such as almonds, exceeds $11 billion. This underscores their indispensable role in maintaining biodiversity, influencing not only wild habitats but also agricultural landscapes.
In collaboration with Quinn McFrederick and James Crall, we will explore the impacts of climate change on pollinators' health and fitness, as well as the behaviors, traits, and interactions that enable bee populations to persist and thrive. Using California native Blue Orchard Mason Bees (Osmia lignaria) as our study organism, we will combine field, experimental, and laboratory techniques to temperature sensors and deep-learning-based computer vision to understand the underlying mechanisms driving plant-pollinator interactions and the effects of climate change on the outcome of these interactions.
In collaboration with Quinn McFrederick and James Crall, we will explore the impacts of climate change on pollinators' health and fitness, as well as the behaviors, traits, and interactions that enable bee populations to persist and thrive. Using California native Blue Orchard Mason Bees (Osmia lignaria) as our study organism, we will combine field, experimental, and laboratory techniques to temperature sensors and deep-learning-based computer vision to understand the underlying mechanisms driving plant-pollinator interactions and the effects of climate change on the outcome of these interactions.
Interaction flexibility and community robustness
As ecological communities respond to global change, species may either go extinct or form novel interactions. Despite considerable theoretical and empirical advances, the scarcity of data spanning wide temporal scales has hampered our understanding of the factors that enable species to be flexible in their interaction patterns. This has ultimately hindered our efforts to anticipate species’ vulnerability to extinction, and the subsequent loss of ecosystem services. To tackle this problem, we focus at both the individual and community/population levels to explore how interaction flexibility enables species to respond to shifting ecological contexts.
Climate change and the distribution of species interactions
Species distributions and species interactions can shift in response to climate change. Most studies to date overlook the importance of species interactions when modeling shifts in species’ geographical distributions. In collaboration with Jordi Bascompte, this project aims to combine interaction networks with species distributions to create species interaction distributions and model how these distributions change across alternative climate scenarios.