Dominância, distribuição e diversidade de palmeiras ao longo de gradientes ambientais na Amazônia

Abstract

The aim of this thesis was to study the patterns of dominance, diversity and species distribution in Amazonian palms. In the first chapter we explored the continental patterns of variation in palm species dominance by relating palm and tree basal area with soil physical properties. In this chapter, we showed that soil physical properties establish the upper limit for palm and tree basal area and that the direction of this relationship differs between them. As soil resistance to root penetration heightens, tree basal area decreases and palm basal area increases. The mechanism of forest partitioning by palms as trees is related to forest structure at the local scale and with forest physiognomy at the basin scale. In the second chapter we explored the regional patterns of palm species abundance variation in relation to environmental gradients and their effect on dominance and floristic composition patterns. In this chapter we demonstrate that subtle and abrupt differences in floristic composition may be caused by changes in species abundance in relation to environmental conditions. We also showed that dominance patterns are linked with the patterns of floristic variation and suggest a mechanism to explain the occurrence of dominance in tropical forests. In the third chapter, we tested the hypothesis that species segregation along subtle environmental gradients will explain species coexistence in local and regional scale. In this chapter, we showed that palm species are segregated along a hydrological axis of soil moisture and that the hydrological niche affiliation of the species is a character that evolved through palm evolution and