BECAS
DÍAZ DOMINGUEZ RaÚl Enrique
artículos
Título:
Thallus hydrophobicity: a low-cost method for understanding lichen ecophysiological responses to environmental changes
Autor/es:
KOCH, NATALIA; DÍAZ, RAÚL; FÁVARO, ANA; STANTON, DANIEL
Revista:
Applications in Plant Sciences
Editorial:
Botanical Society of America
Referencias:
Año: 2024
ISSN:
2168-0450
Resumen:
PremiseMethods to evaluate lichen thalli hydrophobicity were described in the past, but onlyrecently this was shown to be an important functional trait related to water regulationdynamics that could be used to predict future climate change effects.Methods and ResultsOur protocol requires only a micropipette, distilled water, a tripod and a phone orcamera. Hydrophobicity is inferred from multiple metrics associated with absorptiontimes of standardized droplets (initial and total absorption time). We used a dataset of98 lichen taxa with different growth forms and from different biomes and demonstratedthat this method is well suited for capturing different levels of hydrophobicity, includingvery hydrophilic species.ConclusionsOur results show that the measurement of lichen hydrophobicity is a rapid and low-costmethod to assess an ecophysiologically based lichen functional trait that can be usedwith almost no limitations, including in different climates, lichen species, and growthforms.
