Species traits : a functional approach to biodiversity, from organisms to ecosystems
Participants au cours en 2016
Next formation
May 27 - June 1 2018
Description
In 2018, we are presenting the 7th edition of the graduate thematic course, this year sponsored principally by the following centres : the Centre for Forest Research (CFR: http://www.cef-cfr.ca), the Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science (CSBQ 
), and the Hydro-Quebec Institute in Environment, Development and Society (IEDS ), based at Université Laval and by the Universidad del Rosario, Bogota, Colombia (host: Juan Posada)
Participants au cours en 2015
The course is offered for credit for MSc and PhD students: Sujets spéciaux en écologie fonctionnelle FOR - 7034 (3 credits, summer course at Université Laval) and students from other universities in Quebec can register through the system of exchange of credits among Quebec universities (CRÉPUQ) . Those students registered for credit will have the price of the course reduced by half.
Registration and Practical Information
The price of 300 US$ (370 CAN$, 240 euros) includes room, breakfast and lunch, as well as transportation to the field school from Bogota. To apply please send a message to Juan Posada juan.posada@urosario.edu.co with the following application form and a CV. http://www.urosario.edu.co/Programa-de-Biologia/Documentos/Poster_Final_FTC_2018.pdf We require this form and CV to evaluate applicants. The deadline for application is March 1st and accepted students will be informed by mid-March. For any questions refer to Juan or to Alison Munson: alison.munson@sbf.ulaval.ca
Objectives
- Presentation of concepts and theory related to functional plant traits
- Analysis of traits at organismal, community and ecosystem levels (including relationship to ecosystem function and ecological services)
- Examples of use for land use change, climate change, plant-microbe interactions
- Measures of traits in the field in teams, analysis and presentation of data
- Presentation of available data banks and their correct use
Participants au cours en 2013
Professors
Professors confirmed to date for 2018 include Carlos Carmona, Eric Garnier, Alison Munson, Juan Posada, Bill Shipley and Fernando Silveira.
Course content
A detailed program will be available for the end of March, however, the objectives and many of the topics covered are detailed here. The course includes measurement of traits in the field in teams (supervised by professors), followed by analyses, interpretation and presentation of collected data to the group at the end of the week. Registered students will also present their research topic to the group for discussion.
Participants and pictures
| Year | Participants | Course picture |
| 2009 | See | See |
| 2011 | See | See |
| 2012 | See | See |
| 2013 | See | See |
| 2015 | See | See |
Participants au cours en 2012
Readings
Required reading list
- Keddy, P.A. (1992) Assembly and Response Rules - 2 Goals for Predictive Community Ecology
. Journal of Vegetation Science, 3(2): 157-164.
- Lavorel, S. & Garnier, E. (2002) Predicting changes in community composition and ecosystem functioning from plant traits: revisiting the Holy Grail . Functional Ecology, 16: 545-556.
- Violle, C., Navas, M. L., Vile, D., Kazakou, E., Fortunel, C., Hummel, I. & Garnier, E. (2007) Let the concept of trait be functional! Oikos, 116 (5): 882-892.
- Westoby, M., Falster, D.S., Moles, A.T., Vesk, P.A. & Wright, I.J. (2002) Plant ecological strategies: Some leading dimensions of variation between species. ,Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 33: 125-159.
- Wright I. J., P.B. Reich, M. Westoby, D. Ackerly, Z. Baruch, J. Cavender-Bares, T. Chapin, H. Cornelissen, M. Diemer, E. Garnier, J. Gulias, K. Hikosaka & B. Lamont. (2004) The worldwide leaf economics spectrum . Nature 428:821-827.
Participants au cours en 2011
Reference book
- Garnier, E, Navas M-L and Grigulis, K. (in press). Plant Functional Diversity - Organismic traits, community structure, ecosystem properties. Oxford University Press.
- Garnier, E and Navas M-L. 2013. Diversité fonctionnelle des plantes: Traits des organisms, structure des communautés, propriétés des écosystèmes. De boeck. 353 p.
- Grime, J.P. (2001) Plant Strategies, Vegetation Processes, and Ecosystem Properties, 2nd Edition edn. John Wiley & Sons, Chichester.
Standard protocols
- Cornelissen J.H.C et al. (2003) A handbook of protocols for standardised and easy measurement of plant functional traits worldwide. Australian Journal Botany, 51: 335-380.
- Pérez-Harguindeguy N. et al. (2013) New handbook for standardised measurement of plant functional traits worldwide. Australian Journal of Botany 61, 167–234.
Other priority readings
- de Bello, F., Lavorel, S., Díaz, S., Harrington, R., Cornelissen, J.H.C., Bardgett, R.D., Berg, M.P., Cipriotti, P., Feld, C.K., Hering, D., Martins da Silva, P., Potts, S.G., Sandin, L., Sousa, J.P., Storkey, J., Wardle, D.A., Harrison, P.A. (2010) Towards an assessment of multiple ecosystem processes and services via functional traits. Biodiversity and Conservation, 19, 2873-2893.
- De Deyn, G.B., Cornelissen, J.H.C., Bardgett, R.D., 2008. Plant functional traits and soil carbon sequestration in contrasting biomes. Ecology Letters, 11, 516–531.
- Garnier, E., Cortez, J. Billés, G. Navas, M.-L., Roumet, C., Debussche, M., Laurent, G., Blanchard, A., Aubry, D., Bellmann, A., Neill, C. and Toussaint, J.-P. (2004) Plant functional markers capture ecosystem properties during secondary succession . Ecology, 85: 2630-2637.
- Garnier, E., Navas, M.-L. (2012) A trait-based approach to comparative functional plant ecology: concepts, methods and applications for agroecology: A review. Agronomy for Sustainable Development.
- Grime, J.P. (1977) Evidence for the existence of three primary strategies in plants and its relevance to ecological and evolutionary theory . American Naturalist, 111, 1169-1194.
- Grime, J.P. (1998) Benefits of plant diversity to ecosystems: immediate filter and founder effects . Journal of Ecology, 86: 902-910.
- Kattge, J. et al. (2011) TRY- a global database of plant traits. Global Change Biology 17: 2905-2935.
- Moles, A.T., Leishman, M.R., 2008. The seedling as part of a plant’s life history strategy. In: Leck, M.A., Parker, V.T., Simpson, R.L. (Eds.), Seedling Ecology and Evolution. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 217–238.
- Naeem, S. and Bunker D.E. (2009) TraitNet: furthering biodiversity research through the curation, discovery, and sharing of species trait data Δ. (Chap 20) In Biodiversity, Ecosystem Functioning, & Human Wellbeing: An Ecological and Economic Perspective. (Edited by Naeem, S., Bunker,D.E., Hector, A., Loreau, M. and Perrings, C.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, pages : 281-289.
- Pavoine, S. and Bonsall, M. B. (2011), Measuring biodiversity to explain community assembly: a unified approach. Biological Reviews, 86: 792–812. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-185X.2010.00171.x
- Petchey, O. L. and Gaston, K. J. (2006),Functional diversity: back to basics and looking forward. Ecology Letters, 9: 741–758. doi: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2006.00924.x
- Poorter, H., Niinemets, Ü., Poorter, L., Wright, I.J., Villar, R. (2009)Causes and consequences of variation in leaf mass per area (LMA): a meta-analysis. New Phytologist, 182, 565-588.
- Shipley, B. (2007) Comparative plant ecology as a tool for integrating across scales . Annals of Botany, 99: 965-966.
- Shipley, B., Vile, D., & Garnier, E. (2006) From plant traits to plant communities: a statistical mechanistic approach to biodiversity . Science 314: 812-814.
- Violle, Cyrille et al.(2012) The return of the variance: intraspecific variability in community ecology. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 27 (4): 244 - 252.
And more if you have extra time…
- Birouste, M., Kazakou, E., Blanchard, A. and Roumet, C. (2012) Plant traits and decomposition: are the relationships for roots comparable to those for leaves? Annals of Botany, 109: 463-472.
- Garnier, E., Lavorel, S., Ansquer, P., Castro, H., Cruz, P., Dolezal, J., Eriksson, O., Fortunel, C., Freitas, H., Golodets, C., Grigulis, K., Jouany, C., Kazakou, E., Kigel, J., Kleyer, M., Lehsten, V., Lepš, J., Meier, T., Pakeman, R., Papadimitriou, M., Papanastasis, V.P., Quested, H., Quétier, F., Robson, M., Roumet, C., Rusch, G., Skarpe, M., Sternberg, M., Theau, J.-P., Thébault, A., Vile, D. & Zarovali, M. (2007) Assessing the effects of land use change on plant traits, communities and ecosystem functioning in grasslands: a standardized methodology and lessons from an application to 11 European sites . Annals of Botany, doi : 10.1093/aob/mcl215.
- Kikuzawa, K & MJ Lechowicz. (2006) Towards a synthesis of relationships among leaf longevity, instantaneous photosynthetic rate, lifetime leaf carbon gain and the gross primary production of forests . American Naturalist, 168: 373-383.
- Leps, J., de Bello, F., Lavorel, S., Berman, S. (2006) Quantifying and interpreting functional diversity of natural communities: practical considerations matter. Preslia 78(4): 481-501.
- Niklas, K. J., E. D. Cobb, U. Niinemets, P.B. Reich, A. Sellin, B. Shipley, I. J. Wright. (2007) ‘‘Diminishing returns’’ in the scaling of functional leaf traits across and within species groups . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104: 8891-8896.
- Michener, W.K. and Jones, M.B (2012). Ecoinformatics: supporting ecology as a data-intensive science . Trends in ecology & evolution 27: 85-93.
- Orwin, K.H., Buckland, S.M., Johnson, D., Turner, B.L., Smart, S., Oakley, S. and Bardgett, R.D. (2010) Linkages of plant traits to soil properties and the functioning of temperate grassland . Journal of Ecology, 98(5): 1074-1083.
- Ostle, N.J. et al. (2009) Integrating plant-soil interactions into global scale carbon cycle models. Journal of Ecology, 97: 851-863.
- Reich, P.B., I.J. Wright, C.H. Lusk. (2007) Predicting leaf functional traits from simple plant and climate attributes using the GLOPNET global data set . Ecological Applications, 17: 1982-1988.
- Shipley, Bill, MJ Lechowicz, Ian Wright and PB Reich. (2006) Fundamental tradeoffs generating the worldwide leaf economics spectrum . Ecology, 87(3): 535-541.
- Villéger S., Mason N. W. H. and Mouillot D. (2008) New multidimensional functional diversity indices for a multifaceted framework in functional ecology. Ecology 89 (8): 2290-2301
