Structural and functional changes of oribatid mite communities with the conversion of rainforest into human land-use systems at landscape level

Biodiversity loss in rainforests triggered by land-use changes has risen dramatically in the past decades. Rapid expansion of deforestation and intensively managed monoculture plantations have been severely threatening biodiversity and thus also ecological functions. Oribatid mites are among the most diverse and abundant soil microarthropods occupying a wide range of trophic niche in soil food webs. These tiny animals are sensitive to environmental disturbance due to their typical characteristics, which include relatively long life cycles compared to other microarthropods, low fecundity and limited dispersal ability. Therefore, they have been used as a suitable indicator of ecological changes in disturbed landscapes.
The main objective of my PhD project is to evaluate the impacts of forest clearcutting and monoculture plantation on the community structure and function of oribatid mites at landscape level. This project is a continuing study of the former collaborative German-Indonesia research project „Ecological and Socioeconomic Functions of Tropical Lowland Rainforest Transformation Systems (EFForTS)“. All the samples were collected from Jambi province of Sumatra, which has been suffering greatly from deforestation and monoculture plantations. There are four different land systems that will be assessed, i.e. rainforest, oil palm plantations, rubber plantations and shrubland.
Combination of different analyses, including driving factors for community assembly, functional traits and trophic ecology using stable isotopes will be employed to investigate the impacts of land-use change to the community structure of oribatid mites. The results of this project can be used as an essential scientific baseline in designing more eco-friendly agriculture in tropical regions to protect soil biodiversity and its functions.

Isma Dwi Kurniawan is a lecturer at the Department of Biology, UIN Sunan Gunung Djati Bandung, Indonesia. He finished his master degree at Universitas Gadjah Mada. His expertise lies in animal ecology, with soil arthropods as the main interest. He joined the AG-Scheu in May 2024 as a PhD student. His study is sponsored by Beasiswa Indonesia Bangkit (Kemenag-LPDP), a scholarship provided by the Indonesian government. During his study, he will focus on landscape assessment of disturbed tropical rainforest with soil oribatid mites (Acari: Oribatida) as bioindicator group.