Desarrollo de un código de barras molecular para la Reserva de la Biosfera de Gran Canaria

Summary. Biodiversity works as a complex network where the survival of a single species depends on the services provided by many others. We will apply this principle to the management of Gran Canaria’s Biosphere Reserve so that it becomes a multi-disciplinary scenario of biodiversity management. The (biologically questionable) classical scheme of prioritizing the most critically threatened or “emblematic” cases will be overcome by instauring a sustainable holistic model that chooses the best possible conservation strategy based on available data for each taxon. To do so, this first phase of the project will increase the present knowledge of the Reserva’s plant biodiversity, especially focusing on:

(a) the geo-referencing, herborization and genotyping of the 228 endemics of especial interest with the two official cpDNA barcode sequences (rbcL y matK),
(b) the sustainable collection of seeds in the 29 endemics in critical danger of extinction, whose intrinsic survival assets could be almost exhausted, and where the generalised scarcity of populations makes genetic studies of only secondary importance, and
(c) the intensive sampling and extraction of DNAs from other less threatened endemics, to make posible future research to maximise the genetoic diversity represented in germplasm collections and furnish evidence to select donor populations for eventual reinforcements/reintroductions.

Our objectives at the end of this first stage are:
1. To assign values of evolutionary complexity per unit area to detect eventual “biodiversity shrines” within the Reserva,
2. To test the human impact on plant biodiversity comparing the information obtained in the two nuclear zones, the transition zone and the buffering zone,
3. To generate new data to complement our ongoing estimates of the Phylogenetic Diversity of the Canarian Flora (in collaboration with various institutions), and
4. To set the stage for future actions of research and dissemination in the JBCVCSIC.