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Nakamura Lab
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A community ecology lab that explores responses to global warming and typhoons through the relationships between forest plants and insects.
AboutAbout the lab
Community ecology grounded in forest fieldwork
The Nakamura Lab studies forest community ecology, centered on interactions between plants and insects.
In forests in Tomakomai, Nakagawa, and Nayoro in Hokkaido and Kumano in Wakayama, the lab investigates responses to climate change such as global warming and typhoons, as well as the pest-suppressing function of biodiversity.
The basic approach is to find patterns in biological communities through multi-site observation and long-term monitoring, then confirm the mechanisms behind them with manipulative field experiments.
The lab is also in charge of a program in the Forest Research Field Training, which Hokkaido University Forests offers to undergraduates so that they can experience research before entering graduate school.
Key terms
- Community ecology
- The study of assemblages of many kinds of organisms living in the same place and the connections among them
- Forest canopy
- The uppermost layer of a forest, where the branches and leaves of tall trees spread out
- Disturbance
- An event, such as a typhoon or an insect outbreak, that suddenly and greatly changes the state of a forest
ResearchResearch themes
In boreal and warm-temperate forests, the lab studies how plants change their traits in response to environmental changes such as climate change, disturbance, and insect herbivory, and how this alters plant-insect interactions and insect communities. It makes extensive use of manipulative field experiments to identify causal relationships.
*Illustrative imageLarge-scale field experiment warming tall trees
In the Tomakomai Experimental Forest, the lab uses electric heating cables to warm the canopy branches and the soil separately for Mizunara oak trees about 20 m tall, in order to study the mechanisms behind how boreal forests respond to warming. Warming the soil increased defensive compounds in leaves and reduced the amount eaten by insects. An experiment has also begun on tall Erman's birch trees in the Nakagawa Experimental Forest.
*Illustrative imageEffects of disturbance on plant-insect interactions
Using manipulative field experiments that mimic damage, as well as surveys after disturbance, the lab investigates how large-scale disturbances such as typhoons and insect outbreaks affect the relationships between plants and insects in forests. It has found that the effects differ depending on the magnitude of the disturbance and the successional stage of the trees.
MembersFaculty
The members of the Nakamura Lab consist of faculty members and doctoral and master's students.
- ProfessorMasahiro Nakamura
VoicesStudent voices
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Report an errorAbout the images
The top and research theme images are illustrative and were not taken at the lab. They are cropped from Wikimedia Commons images. Cropped CC BY-SA images are provided under the same CC BY-SA license as the original (version shown on each line).
- Top image: “Quercus crispula 01” Σ64 / CC BY 3.0 (cropped)
- Large-scale field experiment warming tall trees: “Quercus crispula autumn colors” Alpsdake / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
- Effects of disturbance on plant-insect interactions: “Forest Destroyed by Winds near El Chalten ( )” Jason Hollinger / CC BY 2.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Regional Resource Management Lab): “Abies sachalinensis, Gora Lopatina, Sakhalin” User:Lupus-sapiens / CC0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Kishida Lab): “Hynobius retardatus” WATANABE Hitoshi 渡辺仁 / CC BY 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Ecosystem Function Lab): “Teshio River2” 河川一等兵 / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Ecosystem Function Lab (Urakawa)): “Creek stream - panoramio” Babiesan / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
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