Evolutionary adaptation and demography in invasive gingers
Name:
Evolutionary adaptation and demography in invasive gingers
Researchers:
Dantas de Queiroz Marcos Vinicius (head – principal researcher)
Provider:
Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico
Realization from:
2025
Realization to:
2026
Summary:
Anthropogenic climate change is accelerating rates of biological invasion across the world, producing substantial socioeconomic costs, particularly in emerging economies like Brazil. The vast majority of literature related to processes inherent to biological invasion is focused on morphological traits of invasive species, but new research is showing a strong association between genomic variation and the success of invasive organisms, which may open up new research into how to control, remediate and prevent biological invasions. To explore the underlying role of the genome in the successful invasion of new environments, we selected in this project two species of Zingiberaceae, Hedychium coronarium (Garland lily) and H. gardnerianum (Kahili ginger), both native to India and Nepal, with invasive behavior on all continents, except Antarctica. The invasive behavior of both species presents a major ecological concern, as they are considered ecosystem engineers, that is, they completely alter pristine environments by inhibiting the growth of native vegetation, modifying the composition of the soil microbiota and facilitating the establishment of other invasive species. Furthermore, as biological invasions continue to increase around the world as a consequence of climate change, understanding how to quickly adapt to sudden environmental changes becomes even more urgent and necessary. Following these premises, our research proposal combines our knowledge in analyzing population genomic data with knowledge of the biology and natural history of species from the Zingiberaceae family of our international partner to understand the genomic and ecological bases of the invasion of both species. To achieve this goal, we will collect samples from native and invasive populations, as well as historical samples from various herbaria, analyzing them under a series of phylogeographic and genomic approaches.
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