Collaborative Research: Computational Analysis of Maneuvering Flight

该奖项由2009年《美国复苏和再投资法案》(公法111-5)资助。动物的机动能力可以决定它能否成功躲避捕食者、捕捉食物和其他决定生死界限的基本行为。大多数关于动物运动的生物力学研究都涉及到弹道、短暂或稳定运动的启动或维持，因为这些运动最容易在实验室进行研究。因此，机动性是动物运动最重要但最不为人所知的方面之一。以前的研究沿着两个独立的轨道进行：1)动物形态研究解释了身体和四肢的大小和形状如何影响机动的效率和动力学。2)神经肌肉生理学的研究揭示了动物用来驱动特定动作的机制。然而，具有产生大量肌肉力量的能力的动物，例如那些盘旋或缓慢飞行的动物，可能能够克服因形态不佳而造成的效率成本，从而产生快速但低效的动作。这项拟议的工作将检验这样一个假设，即当肌肉发电能力较低时，形态施加的限制最强。研究将重点放在蜂鸟非凡的机动飞行上，因为这些动物生活在广阔的海拔范围内，这为改变肌肉力量能力提供了自然实验。在加利福尼亚州用安娜？S蜂鸟(Calypte Anna)进行的实验将确定海拔的影响以及机械和代谢限制对机动性能的独立影响。通过对不同的安第斯蜂鸟动物群的测量，可以确定巨大不同的形态如何影响跨越海拔的机动性能。生物学的不同学科的一个共同要求是有一种定量描述行为的手段。该项目利用定制设计的自动化运动分析来确定机动性的基本构件。开发这种方法将提供广泛适用于研究动物复杂运动的工具。教育培训将促进来自弱势群体的博士后学者、研究生和本科生的科学发展。这些参与者将接受计算生物学和比较生物力学的综合培训。研究结果将被用于开发一个用于高年级本科课程的教学模块。此外，学生和PIS产生的结果将通过科学会议、学术出版物和公开讲座展示。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).The ability of an animal to maneuver can determine its success at avoiding predators, catching food, and other fundamental behaviors that define the margin between life and death. Most research on the biomechanics of animal motion has concerned the initiation or maintenance of ballistic, brief, or steady state movements because these can be studied most readily in the laboratory. Maneuverability is therefore one of the most important but least understood aspects of animal locomotion. Previous research has progressed along two independent tracks: 1) Studies of animal morphology have explained how the size and shape of the body and the limbs influence the efficiency and dynamics of maneuvering. 2) Studies of neuromuscular physiology have revealed the mechanisms that animals use to power particular maneuvers. However, animals with the ability to generate substantial muscle power, such as those that hover or fly slowly, may be able to overcome efficiency costs imposed by suboptimal morphology to generate rapid but inefficient maneuvers. The proposed work will test the hypothesis that the limitations imposed by morphology are strongest when muscle power-generating capacity is low. Research will focus on the remarkable maneuvering flight of hummingbirds because these animals inhabit broad elevational ranges, which provide natural experiments for varying muscle power capacity. Experiments with Anna?s hummingbirds (Calypte anna) in California will determine the effects of elevation and the independent influences of mechanical and metabolic constraints on maneuvering performance. Measurements from the diverse Andean hummingbird fauna will allow for determination of how vastly different morphologies influence maneuvering performance across elevations. A common requirement of diverse disciplines of biology is to have a means of quantitatively describing behavior. This project utilizes a custom-designed, automated analysis of movement to identify the fundamental building blocks of maneuverability. Developing this approach will provide tools that are broadly applicable for studying complex movement in animals. The educational training will foster the scientific development of a postdoctoral scholar, graduate students, and undergraduate students from under-represented groups. These participants will receive integrative training in computational biology and comparative biomechanics. The results of the research will be used to develop a teaching module for use in upper division undergraduate courses. In addition, results produced by the students and the PIs will be presented via scientific conferences, scholarly publications, and public lectures.