P9

Modelling intraspecific chemodiversity – from biosynthetic pathways to ecological consequences

Understanding the causes and consequences of intraspecific variation is one of the key goals of evolutionary ecology. In this endeavour, mathematical models play an important role. They predict how variation is shaped by selection pressures acting at various spatial and temporal scales and they provide null expectations for patterns of variation in the absence of selection. We now have many sophisticated mathematical models for molecular genetic variation and quantitative traits, but models for the maintenance of plant chemodiversity have mostly been verbal so far. In this project, we will develop a new modelling framework for intraspecific chemodiversity that can help us understand the maintenance of intraspecific variation in the presence or concentration of numerous metabolites linked in biosynthetic pathways.