CMG Collaborative Research: Reconstruction of Dispersal Strategies of Marine Organisms via Semiparametric Dynamic Spatial Regression

海洋生物通常要经历一个漫长的扩散阶段，以便从产卵场（源）迁移到有利的育苗场（汇），这是一个对其长期生存至关重要的过程。不同的物种可能会采取不同的扩散策略，以利用海洋环流成功扩散。然而，由于难以直接观察和跟踪微小海洋生物在分散阶段的情况，对这种分散过程还知之甚少。这项建议是关于使用海洋环流模型加上现场数据的生物？分布来重建漂移路径并预测最可能的源位置和漂移初始化的定时。分析的重点是几种鱼类和水母。这些生物体代表了相反的生态谱。鱼类主要在生命早期阶段（卵和幼虫）分散，而水母在成年阶段分散。提出了一类新的半参数动态空间回归模型，并开发了新的统计工具，用于汇-源重建和评估各种扩散策略。所提出的方法提供了一个新的框架，用于评估的传播持续时间，产卵时间分布的重要性，以及来自特定来源的生物体的贡献。此外，还将制定一个扩散策略选择标准，以选择与调查数据最一致的扩散策略。研究小组由两名海洋生态学家、一名统计学家和一名物理海洋学家组成。拟议的工作将提供一般的工具，了解各种物种的扩散策略。气候变化可能改变海洋环流模式，我们对扩散战略的进一步了解有助于预测气候变化对海洋生物种群波动的影响。该方法可以扩展为评估使用其他介质的生物体的传播策略，例如风。将向公众免费提供实施拟议方法的计算机包。该团队将继续保持在跨学科研究中培养博士生的良好记录。

Marine organisms often undergo a long dispersion stage in order to migrate from a spawning ground (source) to favorable nursery grounds (sink), a process that is essential for their long-term survival. Various species may adopt different dispersal strategies to harness ocean circulation for successful dispersion. Yet much is unknown about such dispersion processes given the difficulty of direct observation and tracking minute marine organisms during their dispersion stage. This proposal is about using ocean circulation models coupled with field data of the organisms? distribution to both rebuild drift pathways and to predict the most likely source location and timing of drift initialization. The focus of the analysis is on few species of fish and jellyfish. These organisms represent opposite ecological spectrums. Fish disperse mostly during the early life stages (eggs and larvae) while jellyfish disperse during the adult stages. A new class of semiparametric dynamic spatial regression models is proposed and the development of new statistical tools for sink-source reconstruction, and assessment of various dispersal strategies. The proposed methods provide a novel framework for assessing the significance of dispersal duration, spawning time distribution, and the contribution of organisms from particular sources. Furthermore, a dispersal-strategy selection criterion will be developped that will pick the dispersal strategy most consistent with survey data.The research team consists of two marine ecologists, one statistician and one physical oceanographer. The proposed work will provide general tools for understanding the dispersal strategies of various species. Climate change may alter ocean circulation patterns, and our increased understanding of dispersal strategies can be useful for predicting the effects of climate change on population fluctuations of marine organisms. The methods may be extended for assessing dispersal strategies for organisms that use other media for their dispersal, e.g. wind. A computer package implementing the proposed methods will be freely available to the public. The team will continue to maintain strong record of training PhD students in cross-disciplinary research.