Research Initiation Award: Physical forces impacting the temporal variability of mesopelagic prey at the Cape Hatteras marine top-predator diversity hotspot

研究启动奖：物理力影响哈特拉斯角海洋顶级捕食者多样性热点中层猎物的时间变化

• 批准号: 1600969
• 负责人: Amanda Kaltenberg
• 金额: $ 28.21万
• 依托单位: Savannah State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2016-06-01 至 2020-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1600969&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Research; Initiation; Award; Physical; forces

The Historically Black Colleges and Universities-Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) Research Initiation Awards (RIAs) provide support to STEM junior faculty at HBCUs who are starting to build a research program, as well as for mid-career faculty who may have returned to the faculty ranks after holding an administrative post or who need to redirect and rebuild a research program. Faculty members may pursue research at their home institution, at an NSF-funded Center, at a research intensive institution or at a national laboratory. The RIA projects are expected to help further the faculty member's research capability and effectiveness, to improve research and teaching at his or her home institution, and to involve undergraduate students in research experiences. With support from the National Science Foundation, Savannah State University (SSU) will conduct research aimed at understanding the influence of physical dynamics on the mesopelagic community structure and its role in top predator ecology. This project will be used to enhance teaching and learning at SSU and thus, is geared for increasing marketable quantitative skills in undergraduate education and for preparing our diverse undergraduates for graduate school or the job market. The research and educational efforts will contribute to the mission of SSU's College of Sciences and Technology (COST) to "delivering high quality education, scholarship, and research in STEM" by expanding its existing research capacity. In addition, by providing the opportunities for undergraduates to participate in cutting-edge oceanographic research and gain mentorship in advanced oceanographic data methods, this project addresses the need to equip a diverse student population for the next generation of geosciences, particularly with the research and quantitative skills that will be in greatest demand in the coming years/decades.The goal of the proposed study is to understand the relationships among the oceanography of the mesopelagic community and marine mammal top predators. The specific aims of this project are to: 1) describe the temporal variability of the physical oceanography of the region; 2) describe the temporal variability in the mesopelagic community; and 3) determine temporal linkages among the physical oceanographic setting, mesopelagic prey field, and vocalizing deep-diving marine mammals. This project will result in the application of sensors in a novel way, providing an example of the application and design of multi-sensor mooring package specifically targeted for the measurements of complex ecosystem interactions ranging from the physical habitat and the mesopelagic prey community all the way to apex predators. The findings from this study will provide a great step towards improving the study of marine top predators and their prey, whose focus is shifting from distribution and abundance to ecosystem interactions. This project will be conducted in collaboration with Duke University.

历史上的黑人学院和大学本科生计划（HBCU-UP）研究启动奖（RIAs）为HBCU的STEM初级教师提供支持，他们开始建立研究计划，以及职业生涯中期的教师，他们可能在担任行政职务或需要重新定向和重建研究计划后返回教师队伍。教师可以在他们的家乡机构，在NSF资助的中心，在研究密集型机构或在国家实验室进行研究。RIA项目预计将有助于进一步提高教师的研究能力和效率，改善他或她的家乡机构的研究和教学，并让本科生参与研究经验。在国家科学基金会的支持下，萨凡纳州立大学（SSU）将开展研究，旨在了解物理动力学对中层群落结构的影响及其在顶级捕食者生态学中的作用。该项目将用于加强SSU的教学和学习，从而提高本科教育中适销对路的定量技能，并为我们多样化的本科生进入研究生院或就业市场做好准备。研究和教育工作将有助于科学和技术（成本）的SSU的学院的使命，以“提供高质量的教育，奖学金，并在干研究”通过扩大其现有的研究能力。此外，通过为本科生提供参与尖端海洋学研究和获得先进海洋学数据方法指导的机会，该项目解决了为下一代地球科学培养多样化学生群体的需要，特别是在未来几年最需要的研究和定量技能方面，拟议研究的目标是了解中层群落海洋学与海洋哺乳动物顶级捕食者之间的关系。该项目的具体目标是：1）描述该区域物理海洋学的时间变化; 2）描述中层群落的时间变化; 3）确定物理海洋学背景、中层猎物场和发声深潜海洋哺乳动物之间的时间联系。该项目将导致传感器以一种新的方式应用，提供一个应用和设计的多传感器系泊包的例子，专门针对复杂的生态系统的相互作用，从物理栖息地和中层猎物社区的测量一直到顶端捕食者。这项研究的结果将为改善海洋顶级捕食者及其猎物的研究迈出重要一步，其重点正在从分布和丰度转向生态系统相互作用。该项目将与杜克大学合作进行。