Doctoral Dissertation Research: Water as a Selective Pressure in the Evolution of Primate Behavior

人类在没有食物的情况下可以存活数周，但在没有水的情况下只能存活数天，现代人类已经找到了在世界干旱地区生活的创造性和文化传播性的解决方案。然而，人们对寻水和选择行为的进化起源知之甚少。这一博士论文项目旨在了解经历高度季节性条件的灵长类动物对缺水的适应，包括它们如何定位和导航到水源，为什么它们选择某些水源而不是其他水源，以及这些决定对它们的健康和生存有什么影响。该项目的结果将有助于理解影响缺水栖息地人类和灵长类动物进化的因素，并可能为未来对生活在干旱地区的人类和灵长类动物采取干预措施提供信息。该项目还将支持研究生培训和国际合作，学生共同PI将与研究地点周围的社区共享水质数据。这个项目将检验这样的假设，即水的分布和水质影响范围模式和水的偏好，以及这些行为对寄生虫感染具有下游影响。该项目将研究马达加斯加西部基林迪森林中习惯化的野生红额狐猴(Eulemur Rufirons)的种群，该森林因能在每年9个月的旱季中存活下来而引人注目，而旱季通常不会下雨。这些狐猴以站立的水坑为生，水坑的颜色、清晰度和与狐猴群体的栖息地的距离各不相同。这个观测和实验相结合的项目将使用高分辨率的GPS项圈，通过实验控制水的可用性和质量。还将分析胃肠道寄生虫感染的动态。通过这项研究，PI将有助于建立一个新的理论框架，专注于水和水媒疾病作为灵长类行为的选择性压力，以及灵长类在生活或扩展到干燥栖息地时所面临的权衡。

Humans can survive for weeks without food, but only days without water, and modern human populations have found creative and culturally-transmitted solutions for living in dry areas of the world. However, little is known about the evolutionary origins of water-seeking and selection behaviors. This doctoral dissertation project aims to understand adaptations to water scarcity in primates that experience highly seasonal conditions, including how they locate and navigate to water sources, why they select certain water sources over others, and what impact these decisions have on their health and survival. The results of this project will contribute to understanding factors that influenced human and primate evolution in water-scarce habitats, and could inform future interventions for humans and primates living in drought areas. The project will also support graduate student training and international collaborations, and the student co-PI will share data on water quality with communities around the study site. This project will test the hypotheses that water distribution and water quality influence ranging patterns and water preference, and that these behaviors have downstream effects on parasite infection. The project will study a population of habituated, wild red-fronted lemurs (Eulemur rufifrons) at Kirindy Forest in western Madagascar that is remarkable for surviving an annual 9-month dry season in which no rain typically falls. These lemurs subsist on standing waterholes that vary in color, clarity, and distance from lemur groups' home ranges. This combined observational and experimental project will employ high-resolution GPS collars, experimentally manipulated water availability and quality. Gastrointestinal parasite infection dynamics will also be analyzed. Through this research, the PIs will contribute to a new theoretical framework focused on water and water-borne disease as a selective pressure on primate behavior, and on the trade-offs that primates face when living in or expanding into dry habitats.