The University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus (UPR-RP) is renewing its Center for Applied Tropical Ecology (CATEC) via Phase II CREST support. CATEC serves as a catalyst for systemic change in educational, research development and structural institutional transformation in a Hispanic minority serving institution. CATEC's mission is to promote a) training of human resources at the graduate, undergraduate and post-doctoral levels, b) state-of-the-art research in conservation biology and environmental issues, c) infrastructure improvement, and d) production of relevant results for policy and conservation management. The unifying theme of CATEC is biodiversity conservation under the scenario of climate change. The Molecular Ecology, Evolution and Genetics (MEEG) area will address conservation issues using molecular markers to understand the phylogeny, the spatial distribution of genetic diversity, and species interactions in the Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. The Species and Population Management (SPM) area will focus on impact of interactions between exotic and native species, and understanding patterns of regional diversification and distribution of endangered species and species of economic importance. The Ecosystem Processes (EP) area will address the question of how species, both terrestrial and marine, respond to climate variability, by comparing the effect of paleoclimatic change with the impact of temporal and spatial variation in climate as well as historical anthropogenic changes in land use on ecosystem structure and function.
