Impact of land-use changes in the arthropod fauna of the Azores.

Objectivo

The study is focused in the biodiversity patterns of endemic, native and introduced arthropod species (epigean and canopy insects and spiders) across different anthropic land uses: native forest, exotic forests, semi-natural forest and intensive pasture in Azores. Azores archipelago has nine volcanic islands of recent origin located in the North Atlantic, including priority habitats for the NATURA 2000 European Conservation scheme. This work will be carried out in three islands of Azores archipelago (Flores, Faial and Santa María) using available datasets in ATLANTIS (www.azoresbioportal.angra.uac.pt.). After the first study year using available data, samplings can be carried out to characterise the land uses and species biodiversity in other islands (S. Miguel, S. Jorge and Pico), updating the dataset in ATLANTIS.

1) To evaluate biodiversity patterns of the arthropod community across human perturbation gradients.
2) To evaluate the role of endemic vegetation to keep the arthropod diversity
3) To evaluate changes in community functionality across a gradient of anthropic perturbations: taxonomic vs. body size diversity.