| The Amazon region is one of the richest areas on the planet in terms of its biodiversity and natural resources. The large scale harvesting of trees in this region is a relatively new activity, and it is uncertain whether the exploitation of timber species will result in depletion of forest genetic resources. To examine this, I have assessed levels of inbreeding, gene flow, and genetic diversity in populations of Amazonian forest trees undergoing logging. Because of their high variability within populations, microsatellite genetic markers were chosen for the study, and it was verified through an initial sampling experiment that this class of markers is sufficiently stable within somatic tissue of large and long-lived trees such that population studies could be undertaken with them. By sampling adult trees and seed progenies at several microsatellite loci, high levels of gene flow and low levels of inbreeding were found within populations of Sextonia rubra and Carapa guianensis, two important insect-pollinated Amazonian forest tree species. Comparing seed progeny collected before versus after selective logging of a population of Carapa guianensis, no measurable evidence was found that that the population genetic dynamics is impacted by logging. In particular, levels of inbreeding, gene flow, and population substructure were the same before and after logging. Comparing different populations distributed over the Amazon basin, a phylogeographical structure in the chloroplast DNA of Carapa guianensis that corresponds to major tributaries of the Amazon river was discovered, suggesting that seed dispersal through rivers may contribute to genetic connectivity among populations. Overall, the results of this thesis suggest that the large effective population sizes, the high levels of gene flow, and the low levels of inbreeding in exploited Amazonian tree populations may allow them to counteract potential negative genetic impacts of selective logging, at least at the levels of harvesting carried out during this study, and for the Carapa guianensis population investigated. |
