Thallus hydrophobicity: a low-cost method for understanding lichen ecophysiological responses to environmental changes

Premise: Methods to evaluate lichen thalli hydrophobicity were described in the past, but only recently this was shown to be an important functional trait related to water regulation dynamics that could be used to predict future climate change effects.
Methods and Results: Our protocol requires only a micropipette, distilled water, a tripod and a phone or camera. Hydrophobicity is inferred from multiple metrics associated with absorption times of standardized droplets (initial and total absorption time). We used a dataset of 93 lichen taxa with different growth forms and from different biomes and demonstrated that this method is well suited for capturing different levels of hydrophobicity, including very hydrophilic species.
Conclusions: Our results show that the measurement of lichen hydrophobicity is a rapid and low-cost method to assess an ecophysiologically based lichen functional trait that can be used with almost no limitations, including in different climates, lichen species, and...

研究背景：过往虽已有评估地衣体（lichen thalli）疏水性的方法，但直至近年，该特性才被证实为与水分调控动态相关的重要功能性状，可用于预测未来气候变化的影响。
材料与方法及结果：本实验方案仅需微量移液器、蒸馏水、三脚架以及手机或相机即可完成。疏水性可通过与标准化液滴吸收时间（初始吸收时间与总吸收时间）相关的多项指标进行推断。我们使用了涵盖93个不同生长型、不同生物群区地衣类群的数据集，结果证实该方法可有效检测不同水平的疏水性，包括高度亲水的地衣物种。
结论：本研究结果表明，地衣疏水性检测是一种快速、低成本的方法，可用于评估基于生态生理学的地衣功能性状，且几乎无应用限制，可适用于不同气候条件、不同地衣物种及……