Reconstructing Pleistocene Range Shifts in North American Ectothermic Vertebrates

环境生物学最重要的目标之一是了解不断变化的气候如何影响动植物的分布。在美国，众所周知，大约2万年前最后一次大冰期的结束是一个极端气候变化的时期，芝加哥和纽约以南延伸了几英里厚的冰盖。人们怀疑这些冰原还有其他气候影响，包括一段延伸到大平原和落基山脉大部分地区的极端干旱时期。研究建议通过对具有不同生态耐受性的多种脊椎动物物种的DNA取样，并分析它们与范围收缩和范围扩张相关的特征变化模式，以了解这种干燥期的影响。因此，目前生活在大平原上的动物将通过它们的DNA提供20000年前气候事件如何影响它们的信息。这项工作将在国家野生动物保护区和长期生态研究地点进行，雇佣和培训来自全国各地的当地高中生和大学生。这项研究将使我们更好地理解为什么我国某些地区的物种多样性非常高，而其他地区的物种多样性却很低，以及未来气候变化将如何影响动物多样性的模式。

Shaffer0213155One of the most important goals in environmental biology is understanding how changing, variable climates effect the distribution of plants and animals. In the U.S., it is known that the end of the last major glaciation about 20,000 years ago was a period of extreme climate change, with mile-thick ice sheets extending south of Chicago and New York City. It is suspected that these ice sheets had other climatological effects, including a period of extreme dryness that extended over much of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains. Research is proposed that seeks to understand the effects of this drying period by sampling the DNA of multiple vertebrate species with different ecological tolerances, and analyzing them for characteristic patterns of variation that are associated with range contraction followed by range expansion. Thus, the animals that currently live in the Great Plains will provide information, via their DNA, how climatological events affected them 20,000 years ago. This work will be conducted on National Wildlife Refuges and Long Term Ecological Research sites, employing and training local high school and college students from across the country. This research will allow us to better understand why some parts of our country have very high species diversity while others are low, as well as how future climate changes will affect patterns of animal diversity.