Harvard Forest Research

Genetic consequences of forest fragmentation

Principal Investigator: Jason McLachlan
University of Notre Dame: Jul 01 2006 - Jan 01 2011:

Abstract:
The fragmentation of New England forests by agriculture and their subsequent reforestation have been well characterized by Harvard Forest researchers in terms of changing forest cover, community shifts, and, increasingly, population dynamics. The proposed research would complement this work by describing the genetic consequences of regional land-use history. The goal of this summer’s research is to follow up on HF based work done by Jessica Mikels in 2006. We hope to model the distribution of genetic variation in several tree species (tentatively beech, sugar maple, red maple, red oak, and yellow birch) in old-growth, primary, and secondary forests. This long-term goal of this project is to understand the process of reforestation in central New England using molecular markers. :