Collaborative Research: Social Environment Effects on Hormones and the Integrated Behavioral Phenotype

动物必须调整自己的行为和其他特征，以适应不断变化的社会环境。例如，个体用来吸引配偶和繁殖的策略和信号通常取决于个体相对于群体中其他个体的社会地位，并且该地位可以随着群体组成的变化和/或其他个体的等级变化而波动。因此，这些行为和信号背后的荷尔蒙和遗传机制可能对社会条件敏感。然而，我们对这些机制知之甚少，特别是在自然条件下生活的野生种群中。本计画将以澳洲细尾鹩莺（Malurus属）为模式系统，探讨行为弹性的机制，以及这些机制演化的方式。这些研究物种非常适合这项研究，因为它们在个体和种群之间都表现出明显的差异，在个体用来吸引配偶的视觉信号中，关于激素（特别是雄激素，如睾酮）对这些信号的发展的影响，我们知道很多。该项目将使用最先进的半自动无线电跟踪系统来持续监测个体之间的社会互动，以检查这些互动对大脑中激素和基因表达的影响，并使用现场社会条件的实验操作来证明根本原因。将进行跨种群和跨性别的比较，使这成为第一批研究女性繁殖信号的作用和调节的研究之一。总的来说，这项研究将有助于更好地了解荷尔蒙和遗传机制，使个人能够适应不断变化的社会环境。此外，这项工作还将在巴布亚新几内亚建设能力，这是一个生物多样性丰富的地区，具有相当大的保护问题，通过关键的伙伴关系和当地人直接参与研究、教育推广和交流活动。还将制作公共教育材料，包括介绍研究结果和研究过程的短视频，通过经过验证和访问量高的互联网渠道广泛传播。因此，该项目将对保护和公众对科学的理解产生广泛影响。动物行为研究议程的一个中心目标是确定雄激素和其他激素在调节装饰物表达和相关生殖行为中的作用，但迄今为止这些作用仍不清楚。一种观点，这已经收到了相对较少的关注，从行为生态学家，是雄激素的表型整合剂的行为，以产生一个适应性的多维表型，是非常适合其社会环境。这个合作项目将建立在以前的研究与Malurus fairy-wren的两个姐妹物种，表现出种内变异的男性和女性的表达，使这个系统独特地适合于研究这些问题。该项目由三个相互关联的研究组成，这些研究将共同和协同地解决有关雄激素如何调节繁殖信号和相关行为的表达的关键问题。首先，从自动遥测阵列收集的社会互动的高密度数据，结合社会环境的实验操作，将用于研究社会互动和早期生活条件在调节个体雄激素水平和繁殖表型中的作用。第二，结合观察，基因组和激素操作的方法将被用来检查雄激素影响整个套件的字符，以产生一个综合的生殖表型的程度。最后，跨性别和两个密切相关的物种的激素植入实验和基因组分析将揭示调节装饰的制作和行为的激素机制的进化约束的程度。通过弥合行为生态学家和内分泌学家看待激素的方式之间的差距，这个项目将改变我们看待激素在调节表型整合和信号传导中的作用的方式。

Animals must adjust their behaviors and other traits to a constantly changing social environment. For example, the strategies and the signals that individuals use to attract mates and breed often depend on an individual's social status relative to others in the population, and that status can fluctuate as group composition changes and/or other individuals change in rank. Accordingly, the hormonal and genetic mechanisms that underlie such behaviors and signals are likely to be sensitive to social conditions. Yet, we know relatively little about these mechanisms, particularly in wild populations living under natural conditions. This project will examine the mechanisms that allow for behavioral flexibility, and the ways that those mechanisms evolve, using Australian fairy-wrens (genus Malurus) as a model system. These study species are uniquely suited to this research because they show pronounced variation, across both individuals and populations, in the visual signals that individuals use to attract mates, and a great deal is known about the effects of hormones (particularly androgens like testosterone) on the development of these signals. This project will use a state-of-the-art semi-automated radio tracking system to continuously monitor social interactions among individuals to examine the effects of those interactions on hormones and gene expression in the brain, and use experimental manipulation of social conditions in the field to demonstrate the underlying causes. Comparisons across populations and across the sexes will be conducted, making this one of the first studies to examine the role and regulation of breeding signals in females. Overall, this research will contribute to a better understanding of the hormonal and genetic mechanisms that allow individuals to adjust to a constantly changing social environment. In addition this work will build capacity in Papua New Guinea, a richly biodiverse region of considerable conservation concern, through key partnerships and direct involvement of locals in research, educational outreach, and interchange activities. Public educational materials also will be created, including short videos presenting results from the research as well as the process of doing the research, for broad dissemination through proven and highly visited internet channels. Thus, this project will have broad impacts on both conservation and public understanding of science.A central goal of the animal behavior research agenda is to identify the role of androgens and other hormones in regulating expression of ornaments and associated reproductive behaviors, yet to date these roles remain unclear. One view, which has received relatively little attention from behavioral ecologists, is that androgens are phenotypic integrators that act to produce an adaptive multi-dimensional phenotype that is well suited to its social environment. This collaborative project will build on previous research with two sister species of Malurus fairy-wren that exhibit intraspecific variation in male and female ornamentation, making this system uniquely suited for examining these issues. The project consists of three inter-related studies that, together and synergistically, will address key questions regarding how androgens modulate expression of breeding signals and associated behaviors. First, high-density data on social interactions, collected from an automated telemetry array in conjunction with experimental manipulation of social environment, will be used to examine the role of social interactions and early-life conditions in regulating individual androgen levels and breeding phenotype. Second, a combination of observational, genomic and hormone manipulation approaches will be used to examine the extent to which androgens affect whole suites of characters to produce an integrated reproductive phenotype. Finally, hormone implant experiments and genomic analyses across the sexes and across two closely related species will reveal the degree of evolutionary constraint on hormonal mechanisms regulating ornament elaboration and behavior. By bridging the gap between the ways that behavioral ecologists and endocrinologists view hormones, this project will transform the ways that we view the role of hormones in regulating phenotypic integration and signaling.