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

动物必须调整它们的行为和其他特征，以适应不断变化的社会环境。例如，个体用来吸引交配和繁殖的策略和信号往往取决于个体相对于种群中其他个体的社会地位，并且这种地位可以随着群体组成的变化和/或其他个体在等级上的变化而变化。因此，这些行为和信号背后的荷尔蒙和遗传机制很可能对社会条件很敏感。然而，我们对这些机制知之甚少，特别是生活在自然条件下的野生种群。这个项目将以澳大利亚仙鹤(Malurus属)为模型系统，研究允许行为灵活性的机制，以及这些机制进化的方式。这些研究物种特别适合于这项研究，因为它们在个体和群体中表现出明显的差异，个体用来吸引配偶的视觉信号，而且关于激素(特别是雄激素，如睾酮)对这些信号发展的影响，人们已经知道了很多。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人之间的社会互动，以检查这些互动对大脑中荷尔蒙和基因表达的影响，并使用现场社会条件的实验操作来展示潜在原因。将进行跨种群和跨性别的比较，使这项研究成为研究繁殖信号在雌性中的作用和调节的首批研究之一。总体而言，这项研究将有助于更好地理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，这项工作将通过关键伙伴关系和当地人直接参与研究、教育推广和交流活动，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，受到相当大的保护关注。还将制作公共教育材料，包括展示研究结果以及研究过程的短视频，以便通过经过验证和访问量高的互联网渠道广泛传播。因此，这个项目将对保护和公众对科学的理解产生广泛的影响。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品和相关生殖行为表达方面的作用，但到目前为止，这些作用尚不清楚。一种观点从行为生态学家那里得到的关注相对较少，认为雄激素是表型整合因子，其作用是产生一种适应其社会环境的适应性多维表型。这个合作项目将建立在之前对两个姐妹物种的研究的基础上，这两个物种展示了雄性和雌性装饰的种内差异，使这个系统独特地适合于研究这些问题。该项目由三项相互关联的研究组成，这三项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，从自动遥测阵列中收集的关于社会互动的高密度数据，以及对社会环境的实验操纵，将被用来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方面的作用。其次，将结合观察、基因组和激素调控方法来研究雄激素对整个性状组合的影响程度，以产生完整的生殖表型。最后，激素植入实验和跨越性别和两个密切相关物种的基因组分析将揭示调控装饰品精致和行为的荷尔蒙机制的进化约束程度。通过弥合行为生态学家和内分泌学家看待荷尔蒙的方式之间的鸿沟，这个项目将改变我们看待荷尔蒙在调节表型整合和信号传递中的作用的方式。

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.