AGENTS

Mediterranean ecosystems are one of the areas where the models predict a more negative impact of the increase in temperatures and the decrease in precipitation associated with climate change. Understanding the mechanisms that have driven the adaptation to climate in the past is essential to predict how species may adapt to future climate conditions. The study of functional traits is key to understand the strategies and syndromes that govern the responses of plants to the environment. Currently, many authors point out the need to move towards the study of functional covariation patterns rather than focusing on individual traits. The so-called economic spectra or functional syndromes represent a conceptual tool to understand which traits are key in the adaptation processes along environmental gradients and the potential correlations between them that can determine the adaptive potential of populations and species.

However, there is an important aspect that has been overlooked both in the study of the economic spectra and in the definition of functional strategies, which is phenotypic plasticity. The existence of phenotypic plasticity in adaptive traits has been considered essential for populations to respond in situ to environmental changes. Using P. pinaster as a study system, the general objective of this proposal is to investigate population genetic differentiation in functional traits, their phenotypic plasticity and covariation patterns in the context of the evolution of resource use strategies and to discern the effects of natural selection and demographic processes on the evolution of these strategies. 

Proyecto PID2021-126399NB-I00 financiado por MCIN/ AEI /10.13039/501100011033