Collaborative Research: Linking biotic interactions and environmental change to understand range dynamics of montane mammals over the past century

合作研究：将生物相互作用和环境变化联系起来，以了解过去一个世纪山地哺乳动物的范围动态

• 批准号: 1457500
• 负责人: Rebecca Terry
• 金额: $ 40.86万
• 依托单位: Oregon State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-06-15 至 2020-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1457500&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Linking; biotic; interactions

Human-based activities are rapidly changing natural environments on local to global scales, calling into question the persistence of ecosystems as habitats shift and species ranges collapse or move across the landscape. Species range shift predictions are routinely based on the direct impacts of climate change alone. But this approach is widely acknowledged as overly simplistic, excluding consideration of other abiotic and biotic factors. Understanding the complex interplay between environmental change and local ecological processes is needed to improve predictions. Paired modern and historical datasets provide a means by which suites of interacting factors affecting past range responses can be modeled and validated over multiple ecological and spatial and temporal scales. This project integrates community ecology, biogeography and biogeochemistry to address the impact of a century of environmental change on small mammals in the Great Basin, a highly threatened bioregion in North America. This project underscores the value of museum collections as ecological archives and will develop a new interactive multi-media exhibit at the Natural History Museum of Utah to highlight new uses for old specimens in ecology and conservation. Finally, this project supports women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), as well as the interdisciplinary training of undergraduate and graduate students and a post-doctoral researcher. Using paired survey data (80+ yrs separation) in Great Basin mountains, this project will determine what factors have mediated range boundary changes of small mammals. Alternate hypotheses will be evaluated regarding how the direct and indirect effects of resource use, species interactions, landcover, and climate change at the local scale have shaped landscape-scale species range dynamics. This mechanistic understanding will be developed within and across time periods, and results synthesized to identify the traits and contexts that heighten a species' sensitivity to environmental change. Structural equation modeling will investigate direct and indirect pathways through which biotic and abiotic factors affect species occurrence and abundance at local sites and range dynamics at landscape scale. Species distribution models will be used to hindcast past species ranges in altered climates. Stable isotope analysis will be used to infer differences in diet and habitat use over time, between mountain ranges, and in the presence/absence of competitors. Mammal stable isotope analyses will be done with museum specimens. This project will facilitate the training of a post-doctoral researcher and students as well as a museum outreach exhibit. The methods and findings will be highly generalizable to other groups and systems and will generate robust and transferrable predictions of how species and communities are likely to respond to future climate and land-use scenarios. Consequently, project results will be directly relevant to conservation and management regarding the role of biotic interactions and resource requirements in mediating responses to environmental change.

以人类为基础的活动正在从地方到全球范围内迅速改变自然环境，随着生境的转移和物种范围的崩溃或在整个景观中移动，生态系统的持久性受到质疑。物种范围转移预测通常仅基于气候变化的直接影响。但这种方法被广泛认为过于简单，排除了其他非生物和生物因素的考虑。需要了解环境变化和当地生态过程之间复杂的相互作用，以改善预测。成对的现代和历史数据集提供了一种手段，通过这种手段，可以在多个生态和时空尺度上对影响过去范围响应的相互作用的因素进行建模和验证。该项目综合了群落生态学、地理学和生物地球化学，以解决世纪的环境变化对北美高度受威胁的生物区大盆地小型哺乳动物的影响。该项目强调了博物馆藏品作为生态档案的价值，并将在犹他州自然历史博物馆开发一个新的互动多媒体展览，以突出旧标本在生态和保护方面的新用途。最后，该项目支持科学、技术、工程和数学领域的妇女，以及对本科生、研究生和博士后研究员的跨学科培训。利用大盆地山脉的成对调查数据（80年以上的间隔），该项目将确定哪些因素介导了小型哺乳动物的范围边界变化。替代假设将评估如何在当地规模的资源利用，物种相互作用，土地覆盖和气候变化的直接和间接影响，塑造了生态系统规模的物种范围动态。这种机械的理解将在时间段内和跨时间段发展，并综合结果以确定提高物种对环境变化敏感性的特征和背景。结构方程模型将调查直接和间接的途径，通过生物和非生物因素影响物种的发生和丰度在当地网站和范围动态景观尺度。物种分布模型将用于在改变的气候中追溯过去的物种范围。稳定同位素分析将被用来推断饮食和栖息地的使用随着时间的推移，山脉之间的差异，并在存在/不存在竞争对手。哺乳动物的稳定同位素分析将用博物馆标本进行。该项目将促进博士后研究人员和学生的培训以及博物馆外联展览。这些方法和研究结果将高度普遍适用于其他群体和系统，并将对物种和社区可能如何应对未来气候和土地使用情景作出可靠和可转移的预测。因此，项目成果将直接关系到生物相互作用和资源需求在调解对环境变化的反应方面的作用的养护和管理。