Collaborative Research: Urban Adaptation and its Role in the Success of Biological Invasion in Anolis Lizards

合作研究：城市适应及其在安乐蜥蜴生物入侵成功中的作用

• 批准号: 1354044
• 负责人: Liam Revell
• 金额: $ 29.64万
• 依托单位: University of Massachusetts Boston
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-06-01 至 2018-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1354044&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Urban; Adaptation; its

Urban areas are expanding rapidly around the globe, resulting in drastic changes to the environment compared to natural landscapes: buildings and parking lots replace natural vegetation in cities. The urban environment, which encompasses a major portion of the US, directly affects the ecology and evolution of species, but little research has been conducted to understand the intensity and scope of these effects. Another critical dimension of global change is biological invasions, which threaten biodiversity worldwide. This project connects two important dimensions of global change to test a novel hypothesis that urban adaptation may increase the success of biological invasions, which often have dramatic ecological and economic effects on the invaded habitats. This award will also support the STEM training of a postdoctoral researcher and numerous graduate and undergraduate students. Curriculum materials will be developed for K-12 education and outreach efforts will target the urban areas where this research will be conducted and where the research team members live. The way organisms interact with their environment is expected to drive intense natural selection on their morphology and behavior. This work will study the crested anole lizard, which is native to Puerto Rico but established via human-mediated introductions in several places outside its natural range. This research will use field and laboratory studies to first test the hypothesis that a widespread lizard species is adapted behaviorally, morphologically, and physiologically to urbanization. Second, the study will test if adaptation occurs at multiple life history stages, including embryos and juveniles. Lastly, the study will investigate a novel idea in invasion biology that adaptation to urban environments may predispose populations to become successful invaders of other urban areas, using molecular data to identify source populations. Detailed portions of the research will estimate thermal tolerance and examine behavioral thermoregulation in different habitats, use SNPs to identify the source population of the invaders, and examine habitat influence on development in the field. This research will help to establish whether or not adaptation to urban areas can facilitate the process of biological invasion, and will likely lead to conclusions that can be generalized across other urban tolerant species and biological invasions.

城市地区在全球范围内迅速扩张，与自然景观相比，导致环境发生了巨大变化：建筑物和停车场取代了城市中的自然植被。美国大部分地区的城市环境直接影响着物种的生态和进化，但很少有研究了解这些影响的强度和范围。全球变化的另一个关键方面是威胁全球生物多样性的生物入侵。该项目将全球变化的两个重要维度联系起来，以验证一个新的假设，即城市适应可能会增加生物入侵的成功，这通常对入侵的栖息地产生巨大的生态和经济影响。该奖项还将支持一名博士后研究员和众多研究生和本科生的STEM培训。将为K-12教育开发课程材料，并将针对进行这项研究和研究小组成员居住的城市地区开展推广工作。生物与环境相互作用的方式预计会对其形态和行为产生强烈的自然选择。这项工作将研究冠毛蜥，这种蜥蜴原产于波多黎各，但通过人类介导的引入在其自然范围以外的几个地方建立起来。这项研究将通过实地和实验室研究，首先验证一种广泛分布的蜥蜴物种在行为、形态和生理上适应城市化的假设。其次，该研究将测试适应是否发生在多个生命历史阶段，包括胚胎和幼年。最后，本研究将探讨入侵生物学中的一个新观点，即对城市环境的适应可能使种群倾向于成为其他城市地区的成功入侵者，使用分子数据来确定源种群。研究的详细部分将评估不同栖息地的热耐受性和检查行为体温调节，使用snp识别入侵者的来源种群，并检查栖息地对野外发展的影响。这项研究将有助于确定对城市地区的适应是否可以促进生物入侵的过程，并可能得出可以推广到其他城市耐受物种和生物入侵的结论。