The demography and dynamics of heterogeneous populations

异质人群的人口统计学和动态

• 批准号: 1257545
• 负责人: Hal Caswell
• 金额: $ 49.98万
• 依托单位: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2013-05-01 至 2017-04-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1257545&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: demography; dynamics; heterogeneous; populations

Predicting how the abundance of populations of plants and animals will change through time depends on recognizing differences among individuals, e.g., young vs. old, mature vs. immature, and on how those differences affect individual survival, growth, development, and reproduction, collectively known as the vital rates. Mathematical models based on these vital rates play an important role in both basic and applied population ecology. For example, they can measure the impact of environmental factors on population dynamics, evaluate strategies for the management of natural resources, and project the consequences of global change on species abundance. However, in addition to obvious differences among individuals, all populations contain some level of heterogeneity among individuals that cannot be measured. This heterogeneity may result from physiological processes driven by food availability, genetic variation, individual history, or environmental effects. This project will develop new mathematical models that include such types of heterogeneity. The population demographic models will be analyzed to quantify the effects of heterogeneity on population growth and sensitivity patterns, and applied to long-term data on Antarctic seabird populations. Educational outreach is a critical aspect of mathematical research in ecology. With the goal of making the results of the research more widely accessible to other researchers, an educational workshop will be organized at the national Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America. The models that result from this work will also have practical application in the management of wildlife populations, and in conservation biology.

预测动植物种群的丰富度将如何随时间变化取决于认识个体之间的差异，例如年轻与老年、成熟与不成熟，以及这些差异如何影响个体的生存、生长、发育和繁殖，统称为生命率。基于这些生命速率的数学模型在基础种群生态学和应用种群生态学中都发挥着重要作用。例如，它们可以衡量环境因素对种群动态的影响，评估自然资源管理战略，并预测全球变化对物种丰度的影响。然而，除了个体之间的明显差异外，所有种群都包含无法测量的个体之间的某种程度的异质性。这种异质性可能是由食物可获得性、遗传变异、个体历史或环境影响所驱动的生理过程造成的。该项目将开发包括这种异质性类型的新的数学模型。将分析种群人口模型，以量化异质性对种群增长和敏感模式的影响，并将其应用于南极海鸟种群的长期数据。教育推广是生态学中数学研究的一个重要方面。为了让其他研究人员更广泛地了解这项研究的结果，将在美国生态学会全国年会上组织一次教育研讨会。这项工作产生的模型也将在野生动物种群管理和保护生物学中得到实际应用。