Senior researcher Xoaquín Moreira of the Biological Mission of Galicia, Pontevedra, Spain, an international leader in plant-insect interactions, will present a Zoom seminar, "Insularity Effects on Plant-Herbivore Interactions: Searching for Biotic and Abiotic Explanatory Variables to Promote Insular Biodiversity Conservation," at 4:10 p.m., Wednesday, Nov. 9. The Zoom link:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/95882849672.
UC Davis distinguished professor Richard "Rick" Karban, an international authority on plant-insect communications, will introduce him.
"For more than six decades, ecologists have hypothesized that insular plant taxa suffer lower levels of
herbivory by insects and mammals, and consequently they have evolved lower defenses or even lost them completely," Moreira says in his abstract. "Although initially this theory was unanimously accepted, recent island-mainland comparisons have shed mixed findings, causing a current vivid debate about insularity effects on plant-herbivore interactions. Inconsistency in patterns reported thus far is basically because studies remain limited in scope both geographically and taxonomically and do not usually consider the multi-trophic context in which plant-herbivore interactions are immersed."
"In this seminar, I will talk about the knowledge gaps and research opportunities on this topic. In particular, further studies should include (1) a broader geographical extent of island-mainland comparisons with site replication within each system and multiple systems (at both regional and global scales), (2) a more comprehensive and integrative assessment of plant defensive phenotypes (multiple traits and their co-expression patterns), (3) measurements ofherbivory by vertebrate and invertebrate herbivores species and guilds, and (4) a consideration of multi-trophic context in which plant-herbivore interactions are embedded, namely how predators and parasitoids respond to insularity and their relative influence on mainland vs. island herbivory and plant defenses." (See more information on his website at https://plantherbivory.weebly.com.)
"Dr. Moreira has done work on various aspects of plant defenses against herbivores," Karban said. "He is best known for papers about the costs of defense, the effects of variable host plants on herbivores and their natural enemies, elevational and latitudinal variation in herbivory, and plant communication that affects herbivory."
Moreira holds a bachelor's degree (2005) in forestry from the University of Santiago and received both his master's degree (2007) and doctorate (2010) from the University of Vigo, Spain. Moreira, who joined the Biological Mission of Galicia in 2015, has served as a senior researcher there since 2021. He was a Fulbright postdoctoral researcher from 2012 to 2014 in the UC Irvine Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.
Emily Meineke, assistant professor of urban landscape entomology, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, coordinates the department's seminars for the 2022-23 academic year. All 11 seminars will take place both person and virtually at 4:10 p.m. on Wednesdays in Room 122 of Briggs Hall except for the Nov. 9th and Dec. 7th seminars, which will be virtual only, she said. (See list of seminars)
For further information on the seminars or to resolve any technical difficulties with Zoom, contact Meineke at ekmeineke@ucdavis.edu.
Attached Images:
An example of insect-plant interaction: a red-humped caterpillar, Schizura concinna, munching on a Western redbud leaf. This insect is found throughout much of the United States. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
This is an example of plant herbivory: Elm leaf beetles have defoliated this elm tree leaf. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Close-up of an elm leaf beetle. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)