Habitat specialization and phylogenetic structure of tree species in a coastal Brazilian white-sand forest

Abstract

The coastal brazilian rainforest on white-sand (restinga) ranks among the most fragmented forest types in the tropics, owing to both the patchy distribution of sandy soils and widespread coastal development activities. Here we study the environmental and evolutionary determinants of a forest tree assemblage at a single restinga forest in southeastern brazil. We also explore the ability of competing hypotheses to explain the maintenance of species diversity in this forest type, which includes contrasting extremes of edaphic conditions associated with flooding stress.