CAREER: The use of Quantitative Geography to Predict Population Tipping Points for Colonial Seabirds

亚米分辨率的卫星图像是一项变革性的技术，它从根本上扩展了我们研究殖民地海鸟空间生态的能力。同时，卫星图像和正在开发的探索卫星图像的地球空间工具为地球和环境科学教育提供了新的机会。这项为期五年的项目的研究目标是利用亚米级卫星图像参数化的基于个体的巢址占据模型，估计生物和非生物因素在构建海鸟群体精细空间生态(生物过程)中的相对重要性，并了解这些群体内的动态如何在区域尺度上驱动栖息地占据(地理模式)。该项目涉及三个相互关联的研究活动：1)人工和自动卫星图像解译算法的综合，并使用这些方法创建高分辨率、大范围的企鹅繁殖占有率数据库，根据该数据库将开发特定物种的栖息地适宜性模型；2)构建和参数化分级(物种特定的)随机空间现实结构化集合种群模型，以研究种群形成和崩溃的过程。这些模型由亚米级卫星图像参数化，将阐明局部规模的临界点如何在集合种群规模上驱动紧急动态；以及3)优化空间和/或时间指标，作为即将到来的海鸟群体崩溃和更大空间规模的区域灭绝的迹象。该项目的更广泛影响集中在开发中学地球和环境科学学习模块，这些模块将地理(内容)、地理空间技术(过程)和进入南极洲的虚拟通道(上下文)整合到一个统一的框架中，用于教授纽约州科学核心课程的关键部分。除了这些模块，该项目还将为高中生提供暑期带薪实习，作为纽约科学研究课程的一部分，他们将进行南极生物地理学的独立研究。最后，该项目将为两名博士后研究人员和两名博士生提供研究培训。

Sub-meter resolution satellite imagery is a transformational technology that radically expands our ability to study the spatial ecology of colonial seabirds. At the same time, satellite imagery and the geospatial tools being developed to explore it present novel opportunities for earth and environmental science education. The research objective of this five-year project is to use individual-based models of nest site occupancy, parameterized by sub-meter satellite imagery, to estimate the relative importance of biotic and abiotic factors in structuring the fine-scale spatial ecology of seabird colonies (biological process) and to understand how these within-colony dynamics drive habitat occupancy at regional scales (geographic pattern). This project involves three interconnected research activities: 1) the synthesis of manual and automated algorithms for satellite imagery interpretation, and the use of such methods to create a high-resolution, large extent database of penguin breeding occupancy from which species-specific habitat suitability models will be developed; 2) the construction and parameterization of a hierarchical (species-specific) stochastic spatially-realistic structured metapopulation model to study the processes of colony formation and collapse. These models, parameterized by the sub-meter satellite imagery, will elucidate how tipping points at the local-scale drive emergent dynamics at the metapopulation scale; and 3) the optimization of spatial and/or temporal metrics for 'critical slowing' as an indication of impending seabird colony collapse and, at larger spatial scales, regional extinction.The Broader Impacts of this project center around the development of secondary-school earth and environmental science learning modules that integrate geography (content), geospatial technologies (process), and virtual access to Antarctica (context) into a unified framework for teaching key components of the New York State Core Curricula for science. In addition to these modules, the project will involve paid summer internships for high school students to conduct independent research on Antarctic biogeography as part of New York's 'Science Research' curriculum. Finally, this project will provide research training for two Postdoctoral Researchers and two PhD students.