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Friday Keynote: Dr. Sisimac Duchicela - ÂÌñ»»ÆÞ

Title: Plant Responses to Global Environmental Change in the Alpine

The intersection of two factors, environmental conditions at a broad scale and biotic interactions at a local scale, plays a key role in shaping plant communities. However, it is unclear how plants will respond to changes in these conditions. Because the effects of climate change are intensified at high elevations, alpine plant communities are at risk. It is possible that plant species will shift their ranges towards higher latitudes or altitudes or that warm-adapted species will benefit and increase in cover. In my research, I study the ecological processes driving these changes in vegetation patterns with the aim to provide insights into ways of predicting future alterations and suggest appropriate management strategies. Using climate change experiments set in the Ecuadorian Andes, including open-top chambers to simulate warming and turf transplants to simulate plant community displacement, we have been able to see how these changes will impact tropical alpine plant communities. Another part of my research includes how these data can be used to further sustainable management and ecological restoration research. To do this, I consider social, economic, and environmental factors to understand the motivations and potential benefits of these projects. Because these ecosystems provide important goods and services to millions of people, it is important to understand how changes in land use and climate change will alter plant communities and potentially their availability.

Saturday Keynote: Dr. Jon Velotta - University of Denver

Title: A double bind: adaptations to the extreme cold and hypoxia of high elevation in deer mice

Jon Velotta is an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Denver whose work focuses on the mechanisms of adaptation in wild animals. In his keynote, he will explore how mice living at high elevation in the Rocky Mountains solve a double bind: the need to generate heat from aerobic metabolism in an oxygen-poor environment. He will describe the nature of selection on physiology and performance at high elevation, as well as detail what we have learned about the genetic basis of adaptation to such extreme environments. Although both positive and negative selection are at involved, Jon will demonstrate how selection against detrimental responses to hypoxia may play an outsized role in adaptation to high elevation.

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