CONTINENT: Conservation biogeography of vascular epiphytes in the Neotropics

• Applicant: Glenda Mendieta-Leiva, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Ecology and Biodiversity of Plants and Ecosystems
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 522085167

The currently ongoing deterioration of ecosystems and the resulting biodiversity loss worldwide threaten the provision of ecosystem services and human well-being. The Neotropics, one of the world's most biodiverse regions, are at the forefront of conservation, due to a continuously high rate of land-use change and predicted strong impact of climate change. Yet, as emphasised by the latest IPBES report, effective conservation in the region is often prevented by a lack of standardised biodiversity data and a scarcity of studies scaling from the local to the biome level. With CONTINENT (CONservaTion IN thE NeoTropics) I will address these challenges by harnessing vascular epiphytes as a model group to identify conservation priorities in the Neotropics. Vascular epiphytes—plants growing on trees—are a diverse group of ecosystem engineers that modulate water and nutrient availability; and provide habitat for many animals and therefore are a driver of the outstanding diversity of tropical forests. CONTINENT will build on recent advances in epiphyte research to establish a continent-scale platform for epiphyte biogeography and conservation in the Neotropics. Using a novel combination of mobilisation and curation of local herbaria data, field observations, and cutting-edge analytical tools, I will (1) mobilise and curate a broad range of epiphyte biodiversity data from the Neotropics, e.g. on distribution, functional traits, community composition, and population trends; (2) use this platform to identify epiphyte's centres of diversity and endemism and determine their vulnerability to future scenarios of land use and climate change; and (3) assess the extinction risk of more than 11 000 vascular epiphyte species using state-of-the-art artificial intelligence methods, and convert them into IUCN Red Listing assessments using the CONTINENT expert network. Based on the resulting findings, which will provide synthesis and update the state of the art on epiphyte biodiversity and conservation, I will (4) use epiphytes as a model to identify general conservation priorities for the Neotropics. Vascular epiphytes are representative of Neotropical diversity given their structural dependence on trees, their role as food and habitat for animals and huge representativity of tropical diversity, but at the same time have a manageable number of species and more data available than other groups. CONTINENT will establish vascular epiphytes as an exciting model for Neotropical diversity and identify focus areas for the overall conservation of Neotropical forests. Thereby, CONTINENT will establish a platform to facilitate urgently needed conservation not only of a diverse, functionally important group of plants but also for the forest ecosystems of the world’s most biodiverse and most endangered regions.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants