CAREER: Social Behavior and Genetics in a Fission-Fusion Society of African Elephants

职业：非洲象裂变融合社会的社会行为和遗传学

• 批准号: 0091612
• 负责人: Susan Alberts
• 金额: $ 47.61万
• 依托单位: Duke University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2001
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2001-03-01 至 2007-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0091612&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Social; Behavior; Genetics; Fission

CAREER: Social behavior and genetics in a fission-fusion society. Susan C. AlbertsFocusing on a wild population of African elephants, the proposed project will test critical hypotheses about the evolution of social behavior, using both behavioral data and genetic techniques. These hypotheses address (1) the causes of differences in mating success among males, (2) the extent and mechanisms of inbreeding avoidance, (3) the extent to which social relationships are determined by kinship, and (4) the impact of behavior on the genetic structure of populations. The questions addressed in this proposal are of both general importance for understanding the evolution of social behavior, and of particular importance for understanding the relationship between behavior and genes in a well-studied population of a threatened species. The work will involve the African elephant population in Amboseli National Park, Kenya, which has been the subject of ongoing behavioral and demographic studies since 1974. Elephants, like many social mammals, exhibit long-term associations among female relatives, and mating behavior that favors a class of socially dominant males. However, unlike most mammals, elephants exhibit a very fluid form of fission-fusion society, in which an individual elephant may associate with almost every member of the population in a given year. This raises unique questions about inbreeding avoidance where relatives encounter each other unpredictably, about cooperation in unstable social settings, and about genetic differentiation and gene flow within and between fluid societies. The genetic component of the project will include a large-scale microsatellite analysis and a study of mitochondrial DNA, focusing on 400 individuals. These genetic data will be used to establish (1) paternity for a subset of calves, (2) levels of relatedness between breeding females and males, (3) levels of genetic relatedness between females in focal families, and (4) the distribution of maternal and paternal kin networks within and across families. The educational component of the project includes graduate and undergraduate course development, as well as the development of a workshop for Durham area high school biology teachers, who have expressed a pressing need for additional course content for their classrooms. Durham area public schools have a high (60%) minority enrollment as well as a strong commitment to science education, including the teaching of evolution. The workshop aims to provide course content in behavioral ecology, and to capitalize on the strong popular appeal of this sub-discipline in order to increase interest in basic biological research among Durham's diverse student population.

职业生涯：裂变融合社会中的社会行为和遗传学。 Susan C.该项目将利用行为数据和遗传技术，以非洲大象的野生种群为重点，测试有关社会行为进化的关键假设。 这些假说涉及（1）雄性之间交配成功差异的原因，（2）避免近亲繁殖的程度和机制，（3）亲属关系决定社会关系的程度，以及（4）行为对种群遗传结构的影响。 这个提议中提出的问题对于理解社会行为的进化具有普遍的重要性，对于理解在一个被充分研究的受威胁物种群体中行为和基因之间的关系具有特别重要的意义。 这项工作将涉及肯尼亚安博塞利国家公园的非洲象种群，自1974年以来，该公园一直是持续进行的行为和人口研究的主题。 大象，像许多社会性哺乳动物一样，在雌性亲属之间表现出长期的联系，以及有利于一类社会主导雄性的交配行为。 然而，与大多数哺乳动物不同的是，大象表现出一种非常不稳定的裂变融合社会形式，在这种社会中，一头大象在给定的一年里几乎可以与种群中的每一个成员联系在一起。 这就提出了一些独特的问题，如避免近亲繁殖，亲属之间不可预测地相遇，在不稳定的社会环境中合作，以及在流动社会内部和之间的遗传分化和基因流动。该项目的遗传部分将包括一项大规模微卫星分析和一项线粒体DNA研究，重点是400人。 这些遗传数据将用于确定（1）小牛子集的父系，（2）繁殖雌性和雄性之间的相关性水平，（3）焦点家族中雌性之间的遗传相关性水平，以及（4）家族内和家族间母系和父系亲属网络的分布。 该项目的教育部分包括研究生和本科生课程的开发，以及为达勒姆地区高中生物教师举办讲习班，他们表示迫切需要为其课堂增加课程内容。 达勒姆地区的公立学校有很高的少数民族入学率（60%），以及对科学教育的坚定承诺，包括进化论的教学。该研讨会旨在提供行为生态学的课程内容，并利用这一子学科的强大的流行吸引力，以提高达勒姆多样化学生群体对基础生物学研究的兴趣。