Island Biology Interest Group

Rui Nunes is conducting a Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Landscape Management by the University of the Azores, starting in October 2012 within the Island Biodiversity, Biogeography & Conservation (IBBC) of cE3c. He is conducting the project “Arthropod diversity in Azorean endemic trees: Understanding functional diversity and trophic relations at a local scale”, under the supervision of Prof. Paulo A. V. Borges (cE3c), with Prof. António Onofre C. M. Soares (cE3c), Dr. Pedro Cardoso (Finnish Museum of Natural History) and Prof. Brent Emerson (IPNA-CSIC) as co-supervisors.

Rui Nunes Ph.D. main project aims are: a) to study the structure of the arthropod communities in the canopies of native Azorean forests; b) to ascertain if the canopy arthropod communities assemble through neutral processes or if they follow the precepts of niche theory; c) to determine if native trees in human-disturbed habitats can function as surrogates of the native forest in preserving the unique Azorean arthropod fauna.