ATBC 2022 Best Presentation Award Winners

October 12, 2022

The Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation recognizes the exceptional research of our students and early career scientists with awards for outstanding presentations at the ATBC’s annual meeting. The Luis F. Bacardi Award for Advances in Tropical Conservation is awarded to the individual receiving their Ph.D. no more than 5 years before the meeting date who gives the best oral presentation. This award was established in 2005 with an endowment from the Lubee Bat Conservancy, an international non-profit organization based in Gainesville, Florida, that was founded in 1989 by the late Luis F. Bacardi and is dedicated to protecting biological diversity through the conservation of fruit- and nectar-feeding bats. The Alwyn Gentry Presentation Awards are in recognition of the outstanding oral and poster presentations by students at the ATBC’s annual meeting. Alwyn H. Gentry’s legacy to tropical biology was not limited to the study of the diversity and conservation of tropical plants—he was a caring and supportive mentor to students from all over the Americas. These awards are therefore in remembrance and recognition of the contributions of this singular scientist, colleague, mentor, and friend. The Bacardi and Gentry awards include $100 worth of books from the University of Chicago Press, and a free year subscription to Biotropica.

The New Phytologist Foundation, an independent, not-for-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of plant science, is proud to support student researchers by awarding the New Phytologist Poster Prize in Plant Biology at the ATBC Annual Meeting.

On behalf of the ATBC we would like to thank the early-career scientists that presented their work at the 2022 ATBC Meeting in Cartagena, extend our gratitude to the many meeting delegates who served as judges, and congratulate the following recipients for their outstanding presentations.

Sabrina Russo and Daisy Dent
Gentry and Bacardi Award Co-Chairs

2022 Luis F. Bacardi Award for Advances in Tropical Conservation

Katharine Thompson

Stony Brook University

From Lemurs to Lobsters: Land to Sea Links in a Coastal Socio-ecological System in Western Madagascar

Katharine E Thompson, Cortni Borgerson, Katherine J Kling, Jeanne Mathilde Randriamanetsy, Mamy Yves Andrianantenaina, Alexander Théofrico Razafindrahasy, Claire Surkis, Carter Daniels, Niaina Nirina Mahefa Andriamavosoloarisoa, and Ryan Rothman

Half of the world’s wildlife and plant species are threatened by overexploitation (Morton et al., 2021; Pitman & Jorgersen, 2002). When humans use wildlife species in adjacent ecosystems, hunting may have feedback effects on neighboring environments. Coastal environments tend to be among the most resource-rich ecosystems, yet they receive far less attention than terrestrial forests and integrated socio-ecological studies of human activity and ecology are rare (Williams et al., 2021). The lack of such integrated studies is concerning. Given that access to marine wildlife may indirectly affect the demand for forest animals (Agnew et al., 2009). This is especially pertinent in coastal biodiversity hotspots, such as the West Coast of Madagascar. To address this gap in the literature regarding the relationships between terrestrial and marine resources, we examined the socioeconomic drivers of wildlife exploitation over six months (September 2018 – March 2019) in a village adjacent to Kirindy Mitea National Park (N = 89 households). We explore the relationship between terrestrial and marine resources to clarify who captures wildlife, what species they catch, the methods they use, and the relationships between hunting and fishing behavior. All households relied on natural resources, with 11.1 % exclusively hunting, 26.7% exclusively fishing, and 47.8% both fishing and hunting. This presents an indirect pathway between marine resource use and forest resource utilization. As such, a cohesive, regional landscape conservation approach which considers the cross-ecosystem consequences of resource extraction is essential to the future viability of the human, marine, and forest ecosystems of Madagascar.

2022 Alwyn Gentry Award for Best Oral Presentation

Rodrigo Muñoz

Wageningen University

Climatic drivers of productivity in tropical secondary forests

Rodrigo Muñoz, Lourens Poorter, Jorge A. Meave, Miguel Martinez-Ramos, and Frans Bongers
Introduction. Climatic regimes drive large-scale trends in the structure and composition of tropical forests. However, evidence about inter-annual changes in climatic parameters affecting forests is still scarce, particularly for secondary tropical forests. Objective. Here, we aim to understand how annual changes in precipitation, temperature, and irradiance drive changes in aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) in secondary wet and dry tropical forests. Methods. We used 20 years of forest dynamics from 37 plots at two sites in Mexico to describe 70 years of secondary succession. Remote-sensing climatic data was matched with forest dynamics trajectories to understand the role of annual climate changes on secondary forest dynamics. Results. ANPP in dry forests was very sensitive to climatic changes, with 40 % of growth and mortality explained by climatic parameters. Contrastingly, wet forest ANPP was almost not affected by climate. Seasonality was noteworthy in explaining ANPP at dry forests: growth was negatively affected by wet season temperature, while mortality was positively affected by dry season temperature. Conclusions. Wet forest’s stable dynamics might be related to higher species diversity, in turn, associated with a broader range of strategies to cope with environmental temporal variability. Our results indicate that temperature is the most important climatic factor for dry forests, probably due to its promoting effect on stomatal closure and consequential adverse impact on carbon assimilation rates. Based on these two sites, our study suggests that tropical dry forests have a potentially higher risk of catastrophic shifts than tropical wet forests. Our findings support that preserving biodiversity is crucial to maintaining the climatic resilience of tropical forests.

2022 Alwyn Gentry Award for Best Poster Presentation

Qi Luan Lim

Kyoto University

Historical Effective Population Size of the Endangered Malayan Tapir: Implications for Conservation

Qi Luan Lim, Kyoto University, Norsyamimi Rosli, and Miho Murayama

The Malayan tapir (Tapirus indicus Desmarest) is an endangered species in Southeast Asia. The species can be found in Peninsular Malaysia, southern Myanmar and southern Thailand, and on the Sumatran Island of Indonesia. It is listed in both the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and in Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). According to the IUCN assessment, its population size is estimated to be less than 2500 mature individuals worldwide. However, the wild tapirs are constantly faced with threats from deforestation, habitat loss, and increased risk of roadkill, and further population decline over time is expected. Captive breeding is an important conservation effort to ensure the continued existence of endangered species and can benefit from the information on historical changes in the effective population size of the species, which can be obtained via a whole-genome approach. Six Malayan tapir samples, putatively from Peninsular Malaysia, Thailand, and Sumatra, were selected amongst the captive tapirs in the Japanese zoos. The selection was made by applying genetic information acquired using 38 microsatellite markers and mitochondrial DNA control region. To infer the population’s past demographic history, we used pairwise sequentially Markovian coalescent (PSMC) analysis. We also ran PSMC analysis on pseudo-diploid X chromosomes created for each population pair to investigate the divergence time between the populations. From the PSMC trajectories, we inferred population expansion or migration events during the Early and Late Pleistocene periods. We observed an overall decrease in its effective population sizes over time, which went down to < 10,000 since Middle Pleistocene and < 5000-6000 before entering Holocene. PSMC on pseudo-diploid X chromosomes indicated a divergence time of around 5-9 kya between the Sumatran population and the rest, which corresponded to the rise of seawater level post last glacial maxima that lead to the submergence of the landmass of Sundaland, as well as land-bridges between the Malay Peninsula and the Sumatran Island. We found the PSMC trajectories to be similar to that of the Sumatran rhinoceros from another study, showing that both species share a similar evolutionary history in Southeast Asia. We recommend future investigation into mutational load and functional genes associated with environmental adaptations in these diverging populations to better inform future captive breeding programs.

2022 New Phytologist Poster Prize in Plant Biology

Siddarth Machado

University of Florida

Resilience to drought in a humid tropical Dipterocarp forest, India
Siddarth Machado, and Daniel J Johnson
Climate change has led to an increase in drought intensity and frequency and this trend is predicted to accelerate. The response of biodiverse humid tropical forests to such droughts has been of particular concern given their importance to global carbon cycling and biodiversity. Extreme drought events have been linked to reduced forest productivity and elevated tree mortality. However, predicting the response of humid tropical forest communities to droughts remains a challenge, particularly in biodiversity hotspots, such as the Western Ghats in southern India. We use data from a long-term monitored plot in an old growth Dipterocarp forest to test the response of the tree community and species to a drought event. We expected reduced tree growth rates and increased tree mortality rates in response to the drought event. We also expected demographic responses to be linked to species traits like specific leaf area, wood density and mycorrhizal associations. We assessed tree community growth and mortality response prior to and following the drought event using Bayesian hierarchical models. We analyzed the demographic response at the community, guild, and species level where appropriate. We also tested whether the responses were related to species traits such as specific leaf area, leaf area, leaf thickness, leaf dry matter content and wood density. We found that growth rate was reduced in response to the drought event, while mortality rates marginally increased. Species level estimates had high uncertainty around them due to the limited sample sizes in this diverse community, though the four most dominant species showed a significant negative response. At the guild level, mycorrhizal associations were found to explain tree mortality, with ecto-mycorrhizal trees having lower baseline and drought response. Canopy position did not show clear mortality trends. Overall, the tree community response to the drought event was less extreme than other humid tropical forests, suggesting there is resilience in this community to drought perturbations. A likely reason for this may be the dominance of ecto-mycorrhizal associations in the Dipterocarp community. Continued monitoring is warranted to assess the response of the community to greater intensity or frequency of precipitation anomalies to assess tipping points in this ecosystem. Further, this study highlights the need for large long-term monitoring efforts to more accurately assess demographic rates and resilience to climate change in forests globally.