Dr Nicole Phillips

nicole.phillips@vuw.ac.nz

RESEARCH

The broadest possible context of my research is the population and community ecology of benthic marine organisms. My recent work has been primarily focused on the ecology of reproduction and early life-history stages of marine invertebrates, particularly in the context of recruitment dynamics and life history theory.

Some common themes that run through much of research include: 1) how factors or stresses that influence one life stage may have cascading effects on subsequent life stages, 2) linkages between benthic marine communities and both the nearshore pelagic environment and the terrestrial environment, 3) life history trade-offs that organisms make in terms of growth, reproduction, and allocation to egg/offspring number, size or quality and the environmental factors that mediate those trade-offs and 4) the role of individual, or small-scale, variability in larger scale ecological responses. Below are some examples of on-going and recent projects, also see the work of my students for other projects I am interested in.

Consequences of larval history for marine community structure and dynamics

Traditionally, ecologists interested in the dynamics of populations and communities have relied on the numbers of individuals in them, rather than incorporate how the differences among those individuals may be important. And yet there is a lot of reason to expect that differences among individuals may have strong effects on how species interact and how communities change over time.

In marine ecosystems, many coastal species spawn larval stages which, when released into the ocean environment, sets the stage for enormous variability in traits among individual larvae. Recent studies demonstrate such larval variability can strongly affect the growth and survival of subsequent juveniles into adulthood. These consequences of variable larval histories may operate across many co-occurring species. In a project funded by a grant the Royal Society of New Zealand's Marsden Fund, and in collaboration with Dr. Cathy Pfister from the University of Chicago, we are examining the potential effects of variable larval quality on the outcome of species interactions, and ultimately the dynamics of communities. We are using temperate intertidal reefs as a model system, and the species in this community vary in larval developmental mode

(e.g. feeding vs. non-feeding vs. non-planktonic larvae) adult mobility (e.g. mobile vs. sessile) and trophic level. The different unique combinations of these life-history traits may ultimately minimize the effects of individual differences among early life-stages for some species and exacerbate it for their competitors or predators, thus setting the stage for long-term impacts on community dynamics and structure.

Rocky shore community in Wellington, New Zealand

Causes and consequences of variability in larval quality, quantity and recruitment success

A long-standing interest has been how variability in larval experience, particularly nutrition and food availability, has consequences not only for larvae themselves but also for their performance as juveniles later in life. This body of research highlights the importance of interactions across life history stages, with ramifications for population dynamics, patterns of dispersal, and the evolution of life history strategies. My research has also explored processes that drive variation in maternal condition, and the subsequent role of maternal effects on the production of eggs and larvae, measured both in terms of number and quality of those propagules. Here at VUW, funded both by the US National Science Foundation and internal grants from Victoria University, I have focused on exploring how larval history and the pelagic environment influence recruitment dynamics and population/community structure in intertidal mussels, in a region where nearshore ocean conditions are highly variable over a relatively small spatial scale.

Effects of terrestrially-derived sediment on larval development, metamorphosis and recruitment

In addition to my work on how food availability can influence larval and recruitment success, and population dynamics, I am also interested in the effects of other environmental stressors. In a collaborative project (funded by the NZ Ministry of Fisheries) with researchers at NIWA and with Dr. Jeff Shima from VUW, we examined the effects of terrestrially-derived suspended sediment on the larval development, survival and settlement success of paua (abalone, Haliotis iris) and kina (urchins, Evechinus chloroticus). In addition to the potential of this work to inform management of fisheries and watersheds, our results highlight key differences in how species respond to identical patterns of environmental heterogeneity. Because both abalone and urchins are important

grazers, known to affect community structure on subtidal rocky reefs, their differential responses to suspended sediments as larvae (where they experience similar environmental conditions) may have cascading effects on subtidal communities that are not easily predicted without experiments such as ours.

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