Studies on threatened plants species in South Eastern Norway - Taxonomy and population biology of Carlina vulgaris (Asteraceae) in Norway
South Eastern Norway is home to costal habitats that are open, dry and relatively warm, often with calcareous soils and situated near the coast. These habitats are home to a range of threatened species. An important threat is habitat destruction and fragmentation. To conserve the species of these habitat in the best possible way different types of knowledge is essential, like the distribution of genetic variation within and among populations, the size of populations, do the plants set viable seeds, is there recruitment of young individuals, and other aspects of the specie’s biology. Such knowledge is lacking for many threatened plants. For some of these species, as for species other places, it is sometimes difficult to separate closely related species and to make a decision if something deserves species status or not. As a result rare species may go unrecognized and not get the necessary attention to get properly conserved.
Below are mentioned one example of master projects, but it is also possible to define projects on other species based on a student’s interests in some particular plants or related topics.
This species, called stjernetistel in Norwegian, is distributed in South Eastern Norway on dry, often calcareous soils. It lives for two to several years, and is listed as near threatened (NT) in the Norwegian Red List. Two subspecies are recognized, C. vulgaris subsp. vulgaris and C. vulgaris subsp. longifolia, but their status and delimitation is questioned. To be able to conserve threatened species knowledge as for example genetic variability within and between population, seed production and seed viability is crucial.
Research questions include:
- Are there two subspecies and how can they best be delimited?
- How is the status Norwegian populations regarding factors as genetic variation, seed production, recruitment?
Relevant methods may be studies of morphology, genetic variation, distribution modelling, demographic studies, seed production with germination tests. The outlined project is probably too big for one master project and could without problems accommodate two students. Alternatively selected parts of it could be done by one student.
Main supervisor: Brita Stedje, brita.stedje@nhm.uio.no (with collaborators)
Bilde fra (så vidt jeg skjønner er det til fri bruk):
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Carlina_vulgaris_(3).JPG
Published Apr. 12, 2018 11:12 AM
- Last modified Apr. 19, 2018 8:14 AM
.JPG){kind=link}