International Research Fellowship Program (IRFP): Birds Eating Bugs: The Geographic Mosaic of Preator-Mediated Natural Selection

国际研究奖学金计划（IRFP）：鸟类吃虫子：捕食者介导的自然选择的地理马赛克

• 批准号: 0601971
• 负责人: Shawn Kuchta
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Kuchta Shawn R
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-01-01 至 2009-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0601971&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: International; Research; Fellowship; Program; IRFP

0601971KuchtaThe International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Shawn R. Kuchta to work with Dr. Erik Svensson at Lund University in Lund, Sweden.In natural systems, individuals must avoid being eaten if they are to pass their genes on to future generations. For this reason, predation has a strong impact on organismal fitness. The selective consequences of predation are difficult to study, however, because predation removes individuals from the population and thereby prevents their measurement. Studying the geographic structure of predation intensities is even more difficult. In collaboration with Erik Svensson at Lund University in southern Sweden, this research addresses the geographic mosaic of selection gradients imposed on damselflies (Calopteryx) by an efficient avian predator, the wagtail. Wagtails catch damselflies and return to "slaughter stations" where they remove the wings and consume the body. Collecting wings from slaughter stations and comparing them to the variation present in natural populations allows us to calculate the strength and direction of natural selection on various wing traits, such as the shape and size of color patches. Prior research has demonstrated natural selection on wing traits in one population, but the current research extends this to 22 populations, including "hotspots" and "coldspots" of predation intensity. In addition, high resolution molecular markers are being used to measure the amount of genetic exchange among populations. This data allows us to quantify the interaction between local adaptation within populations versus gene flow among populations with differing adaptive optima. In addition to influencing predation probabilities, color patches on the wings of damselflies function in female choice (sexual selection) and species recognition (visual clues different species employ tell each other apart). The trade-off among the various selective forces is being examined by manipulating the wing patch size in natural populations of damselflies and simultaneously measuring the magnitude of natural selection, sexual selection, and interspecific interactions. This experiment is being replicated in four populations, including two "hotspots" and two "coldspots" of predation intensity. Predator-prey dynamics are of profound importance to the dynamics of natural systems. This research takes an integrative, spatially explicit approach to advancing our understanding of the ongoing selective processes operating in natural populations.

[6071 . 71]库奇塔国际研究奖学金计划使美国科学家和工程师能够在国外进行9至24个月的研究。该计划的奖励为联合研究提供了机会，并利用独特或互补的设施、专业知识和国外的实验条件。该奖项将支持Shawn R. Kuchta博士与瑞典隆德大学的Erik Svensson博士进行为期24个月的研究。在自然系统中，个体如果想把基因传给后代，就必须避免被吃掉。因此，捕食对有机体适应性有很大的影响。然而，捕食的选择性后果很难研究，因为捕食将个体从种群中移除，从而阻止了对它们的测量。研究捕食强度的地理结构更加困难。这项研究与瑞典南部隆德大学的Erik Svensson合作，研究了一种高效的鸟类掠食者wagtail对豆娘（Calopteryx）施加的选择梯度的地理马赛克。摇尾捕捉豆娘，并返回“屠宰站”，在那里它们取下翅膀，吃掉尸体。从屠宰站收集翅膀，并将其与自然种群的变化进行比较，使我们能够计算出翅膀各种特征（如色斑的形状和大小）的自然选择的强度和方向。先前的研究已经证明了自然选择对一个种群的翅膀特征，但目前的研究将其扩展到22个种群，包括捕食强度的“热点”和“冷点”。此外，高分辨率分子标记被用于测量种群间的遗传交换量。这些数据使我们能够量化种群内部的局部适应与具有不同适应最优种群之间的基因流动之间的相互作用。除了影响捕食概率外，豆娘翅膀上的色块在雌性选择（性选择）和物种识别（不同物种使用的视觉线索来区分彼此）中起作用。通过控制豆娘自然种群的翅片大小，同时测量自然选择、性选择和种间相互作用的大小，研究了各种选择力之间的权衡。这个实验在四个种群中重复进行，包括两个捕食强度高的“热点”和两个“冷点”。捕食者-猎物动力学对自然系统的动力学具有深远的重要性。本研究采用一种综合的、空间明确的方法来推进我们对自然种群中正在进行的选择过程的理解。