The phenotypic responses of functional traits in natural populations are driven by genetic diversity and phenotypic plasticity. These two mechanisms enable trees to cope with rapid climate change. We studied two European temperate tree species (sessile oak and European beech), focusing on (i) in situ variations of leaf functional traits (morphological and physiological) along two altitudinal gr...

As modern genomic tools are developed for ecologically compelling models, field manipulation experiments will become important for establishing the role of functional genomic variation in physiological acclimation and evolutionary adaptation along environmental clines. High-altitude habitats expose individuals to hypoxic and thermal stress, necessitating physiological acclimation, which may res...

Predicting how species will respond to the rapid climatic changes predicted this century is an urgent task. Species distribution models (SDMs) use the current relationship between environmental variation and species' abundances to predict the effect of future environmental change on their distributions. However, two common assumptions of SDMs are likely to be violated in many cases: (i) that th...

Farmer management of plant germplasm pre-dates crop domestication, but humans' role in crop evolution and diversity remains largely undocumented and often contested. Seemingly inexplicable practices observed throughout agricultural history, such as exchanging or replacing seed, continue to structure crop populations across the developing world. Seed management practices can be construed as even...

We investigated some entomological factors underlying altitudinal prevalence variation in the Venezuelan Amazonia human onchocerciasis focus. Spatial and temporal variation in relative abundance, daily biting rate, proportion of parous flies, and monthly parous biting rate were studied for the three main simuliid vectors (based on their vectorial competence: Simulium oyapockense s.l. Floch & Ab...

A primary goal of molecular ecology is to understand the influence of abiotic factors on the spatial distribution of genetic variation. Features including altitudinal clines, topography and landscape characteristics affect the proportion of suitable habitat, influence dispersal patterns, and ultimately structure genetic differentiation among populations. We studied the effects of altitude and t...

Spatial patterns of body size are associated with environmental factors like temperature, seasonality, precipitation, resources, and altitude, among the most relevant. Latitudinal have been extensively studied. Studies on altitudinal gradients size, however, relatively few. Besides, it is still unclear whether there variation in relationship between species, or correlations within different alt...

There have been several ecological studies in forests of the Guayana Shield, but so far none had examined the changes in structure and composition of evergreen forests with altitude. This study describes and analyzes the structure, species composition and soil characteristics of forest stands at different altitudinal zones in Southeastern Venezuelan Guayana, in order to explain the patterns and...