Testing for high-elevation quaternary refugia of alpine plants (NUNATAKS)

Laboratoire(s)/équipe(s) du LabEx OSUG impliqué(e.s) : LECA
Porteur du Projet : Sébastien LAVERGNE

Résumé

We propose to revisit the fundamental, yet unresolved, problem of Pleistocene climatic refugia in the Alps. Did alpine plants survived ice-ages on isolated mountain tops emerging from ice-sheets (so called “nunataks”), or did they remain in southern, warmer regions, as this has been classically assumed ? The first scenario may hold for plants dwelling on high alpine summits, because they exhibit traits adapted to very harsh environmental conditions (e.g. cushion life-forms) and extremely long life-cycles (several hundreds of years) impeding rapid biogeographic movement. We will study the high-alpine cushion plant, siliceous specialist, Androsace vandellii, and build our sampling design with available models of glacial extent at last glacial maximum (ca -22ka) developed at ISTerre. Using a population genomic approach (ddRAD-seq) we will confront genomic data with different simulated refugia-recolonization scenarios (ABC framework), and with paleo-distribution modeling at last glacial maximum.

Soutien attribué : 13 000 € en 2015

Bilan :