Physiology and Behavior of Stress in Wild Animals

所有生物都面临着来自环境的挑战（如捕食者或风暴）。动物为了在这些挑战中生存下来而产生压力反应，但即使经过近100年的压力研究，人们对压力反应如何帮助野生动物生存也只有基本的了解。这种知识的缺乏越来越重要，因为人为的有害事件（如栖息地退化或人为干扰）可能导致慢性压力。虽然对捕食者或风暴的短期压力反应是生存所必需的，但长期压力可能是非常有害的，如果它影响到足够多的个体，可能导致种群减少。该项目将使用野生欧洲椋鸟作为模型来测试两个假设：(1)正常环境事件频率的增加会导致野生动物的慢性压力；(2)慢性应激对母亲的后代有长期影响。要验证这些假设，需要对圈养和自由生活的椋鸟的生理和行为进行综合的实验室和实地研究。最终的目标是建立一个长期应激的野生动物的生理和内分泌特征。这将为在野外识别慢性应激个体和确定对这些个体及其后代的长期影响提供标准。更广泛的影响学生的参与对实现研究目标至关重要。研究生、本科生和博士后将接受重要的培训，包括如何捕捉动物、取样、进行分析、写手稿以及其他重要的实验室和现场技能。保护任务可以从额外的信息中受益，以确定动物是否在野外长期受到压力。

Scientific Goals All organisms are faced with challenges (such as predators or storms) from the environment. Animals mount a stress response in order to survive these challenges, but even after nearly 100 years of studying stress, there is only a basic understanding of how the stress response helps wild animals to survive. This lack of knowledge is of growing significance because man-made noxious events (such as habitat degradation or human disturbance) could cause chronic stress. Although a short-term stress response to a predator or storm is necessary for survival, chronic stress can be very harmful, and if it affects enough individuals, can cause population declines. This project will use wild European starlings as a model to test two hypotheses: (1) That increased frequency of normal environmental events can result in chronic stress in wild animals; and (2) There will be long-term impacts on offspring whose mothers were exposed to chronic stress. Testing these hypotheses will require an integrated approach of laboratory and field studies on the physiology and behavior of both captive and free-living starlings. The ultimate goal is to create a physiological and endocrinological profile of chronically stressed wild animals. This will provide criteria for identifying chronically stressed individuals in the wild and determining the long-term impact on those individuals and their offspring.Broader Impacts Student participation will be vital to accomplishment of the research goals. Graduate students, undergraduate students, and a postdoctoral fellow will receive important training in how to trap animals, take samples, perform assays, write manuscripts, and other important laboratory and field skills. Conservation missions could benefit from additional information to determine whether animals are chronically stressed in the wild.