DWARF

WP1: Terrestrial Fauna
Leader: Prof. Hans Petter Leinaas (UiO)

Objectives:

to analyse body size distribution and cell- and genome size of field fresh material from populations of the geographically widely distributed Collembola Hypogastrura viatica, which in one of the most dominant species in coastal habitats of Svalbard.
to study evolutionary aspects of phenotypic plasticity by comparing thermal effects on the same variables (body-, cell- and genome-size) between stock cultures from southern and northern populations
to perform similar studies on selected Collembola relatives with more narrow range (the high Arctic H. tullbergi and H. sensilis and the temperate H. manubrialis and H. vernalis).
to compare trends in body size along climate gradients in true insects (on the dung fly Scatophaga furcata, which is the only efficient decomposer of reindeer dung at Svalbard).
to study thermal reaction norms for the same parameters by rearing animals originated from Svalbard and mainland Norway on homogenized dung at selected temperatures.
to perform deep sequencing of genomes for some of the terrestrial populations/species selected based on preliminary results.