Biogeographic history of plant communities (B01)

The project is aiming to link biological processes and spatial/compositional patterning with environmental proxies limiting seed germination, plant establishment and growth, and will explore plant phenotypic plasticity and variation in the field and under controlled growth conditions thereby focusing on temperature, humidity and carbon dioxide values. Those measures can be then directly linked with environmental proxies obtained and evidenced from field data. An evolutionary experiment using a gene capture experiment and developing a timeline of independent and parallel evolution of epiarenic Tillandsia will provide direct evidence for the onset of tillandsiales in the Chilean-Peruvian Atacama Desert.

DFG Programme Collaborative Research Centres

Subproject of SFB 1211:  Earth - Evolution at the Dry Limit

Applicant Institution Universität zu Köln

Co-Applicant Institution Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn; Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg

Project Heads Dr. Dörte Harpke, since 7/2024; Professor Dr. Marcus Koch, since 7/2020; Professor Dr. Federico Luebert, until 6/2020; Professor Dr. Dietmar Quandt; Professor Dr. Maximilian Weigend, until 6/2020