Collaborative Research: Digitization TCN: Digitizing collections to trace parasite-host associations and predict the spread of vector-borne disease

节肢动物寄生虫(特别是昆虫及其近亲)对人类健康、野生动物保护和牲畜生产力的经济关键问题负有责任。由于自然历史收集是过去和现在寄生虫标本的永久保存库，这些收集和它们的数据可以帮助解决这些在人类和动物健康和安全方面的重大社会挑战。自然历史收藏通常包含更广泛的社区完全不知道的标本和辅助材料，但代表着关于生物栖息地、分布和寄生虫-宿主协会的不可替代的知识。此外，这些收集产生的信息可用于模拟生态过程和物种分布的变化，预测人类和动物疾病的未来传播，更新分类法，并帮助识别迫切需要采样的未被充分代表的寄生虫群体和需要保护的受威胁的寄生虫多样性。该项目将提供无价节肢动物寄生虫收集的数字记录(即标本标签数据和图像)，使可供研究的基线数据在线可用，从而促进新的研究和教育举措。这些新的数字化数据将对我们理解生物协会、生物多样性和其他方面产生直接和长期的好处。陆地寄生虫追踪专题收集网络(TPT-TCN)将数字化100多万个节肢动物标本，这些标本代表了美国脊椎动物的重要寄生虫和病媒物种。这一数字化努力将把数百万脊椎动物宿主记录与州和联邦机构合作者共享的病媒和疾病监测数据整合在一起，为综合的长期研究创造一个新的基础。这个项目是脊椎动物和无脊椎动物标本的分类学家和馆长以及流行病学家、生态学家、数据科学家和生物多样性信息学专家的合作。26个合作研究集合和其他倡议进一步扩大了这一影响范围。该项目将使正在进行的公民科学和公共宣传运动具有工具，以了解节肢动物病媒和相关疾病因环境变化和全球运动而发生的分布变化。公共教育举措包括与自然历史博物馆合作，通过以科学为重点的讲座、展览、暑期青年项目、非正式演示，向公众宣传寄生虫，以及为服务不足的社区的教师开发新的在线教育资源。该项目产生的所有标本图像将用于开发寄生虫快速识别工具，该工具将通过互联网和智能手机应用程序访问，并与iDigBio(idigBio.org)共享。TPT-TCN还将开发和实施本科教学模块，重点放在自然历史收藏中的数据上。这些模块将分发给全美的学术机构，并在网上提供。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Arthropod parasites (specifically, insects and their relatives) are responsible for economically critical issues in human health, wildlife conservation, and livestock productivity. Because natural history collections are permanent repositories for past and present parasite specimens, these collections and their data can help address these significant societal challenges in human and animal health and safety. Natural history collections often contain specimens and ancillary materials that are completely unknown to the broader community, yet represent irreplaceable knowledge about organismal habitats, distributions, and parasite-host associations. Further, these collections yield information that can be used to model ecological processes and changes in species distributions, predict the future spread of human and animal disease, update taxonomy, and help identify under-represented parasite groups in urgent need of sampling and threatened parasite diversity in need of conservation. This project will provide digital records (i.e., specimen label data and images) of invaluable arthropod parasite collections to make research-ready baseline data accessible online, catalyzing new research and education initiatives. These newly digitized data will have immediate and long-lasting benefits for our understanding of organismal associations, biodiversity, and beyond. The Terrestrial Parasite Tracker Thematic Collection Network (TPT-TCN) will digitize over one million arthropod specimens representing species that are significant parasites and disease vectors of vertebrates in the United States. This digitization effort will integrate millions of vertebrate host records with vector and disease monitoring data shared by state and federal agency collaborators, creating a novel foundation for integrative, long-term research. This project is a collaboration of taxonomists and curators from vertebrate and invertebrate collections, as well as epidemiologists, ecologists, data-scientists, and biodiversity informatics specialists. This reach is further extended by the 26 collaborating research collections and other initiatives. This project will empower ongoing citizen science and public awareness campaigns with the tools to understand distribution changes of arthropod vectors and associated diseases due to environmental change and global movement. Public education initiatives include partnering with natural history museums to educate the public about parasites via science-focused lectures, exhibits, summer youth programs, informal presentations, and developing new online educational resources for teachers in underserved communities. All specimen images generated by this project will be used for the development of a rapid identification tool for parasites which will be made accessible through the internet and smartphone apps and shared with iDigBio (idigbio.org). The TPT-TCN will also develop and implement undergraduate teaching modules focused on data held in natural history collections. These modules will be disseminated to academic institutions across the United States and made available online.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.