Eco-evolutionaire dynamieken in een gemeenschapscontext: naar een benadering die evolutie in meerdere soorten tegelijkertijd in rekening brengt

Evolutionary and ecological processes can occur at the same temporal and spatial scales and can therefore interact. A growing number of excellent studies have provided increasing evidence for the importance of such eco-evolutionary dynamics. Most of these studies focus on the eco-evolutionary implications of evolution in single species. In nature, however, communities consist of multiple species that might all evolve simultaneously. It is therefore of key importance to take a multi-species perspective in assessing eco-evolutionary dynamics. My aim is to develop an explicit multi-species approach in studying eco-evolutionary dynamics using four competing freshwater zooplankton species as an experimental model system. I want to assess the relative importance of ecological and evolutionary processes in multiple species in determining community as well as ecosystem characteristics in response to a controlled environmental change. I will first quantify evolutionary responses of all species to a change in predation pressure when grown in isolation and in a four-species community. Then I will quantify the impact of evolutionary trait change in each species separately and when combined on community and ecosystem features. The combination of a selection experiment and eco-evolutionary follow-up experiments will provide me with unprecedented power to implement a multi-species approach to the field of eco-evolutionary dynamics.