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

合作研究：数字化 TCN：数字化馆藏以追踪寄生虫-宿主关联并预测媒介传播疾病的传播

• 批准号: 1902016
• 负责人: Istvan Miko
• 金额: $ 10.9万
• 依托单位: University of New Hampshire
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-09-01 至 2023-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1902016&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Digitization; TCN; Digitizing

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.

节肢动物寄生虫（特别是昆虫及其亲戚）负责人类健康，野生动植物保护和牲畜生产力的经济关键问题。 由于自然历史收集是过去和现在的寄生虫标本的永久存储库，因此这些收集及其数据可以帮助应对人类和动物健康和安全方面的这些重大社会挑战。 自然历史收集通常包含更广泛社区完全未知的标本和辅助材料，但代表了关于生物栖息地，分布和寄生虫主持协会的不可替代的知识。 此外，这些收集产生的信息可用于建模物种分布的生态过程和变化，预测人类和动物疾病的未来传播，更新分类法，并有助于确定代表性不足的寄生虫群体，迫切需要采样和威胁寄生虫多样性，需要保存。 该项目将提供宝贵的Arthropod寄生虫收集的数字记录（即标本标签数据和图像），以使研究就绪的基线数据在线访问，催化新的研究和教育计划。 这些新近数字化的数据将对我们对生物体，生物多样性及以后的理解有立即和持久的好处。 陆地寄生虫追踪器主题收集网络（TPT-TCN）将在美国代表一百万个代表物种的节肢动物标本，这些标本是美国脊椎动物的重要寄生虫和疾病载体。 这项数字化工作将将数百万脊椎动物的宿主记录与州和联邦机构合作者共享的媒介和疾病监测数据整合在一起，从而为综合性，长期研究创造了新颖的基础。 该项目是脊椎动物和无脊椎动物收集的分类学家和策展人的合作，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。 26个合作的研究集和其他计划进一步扩展了这一影响力。 该项目将通过了解由于环境变化和全球运动引起的节肢动物向量和相关疾病的分布变化的工具，使正在进行的公民科学和公众意识运动能够赋予正在进行的公民科学和公众意识运动。 公共教育计划包括与自然历史博物馆合作，通过以科学为中心的讲座，展览，夏季青年计划，非正式演讲以及为服务不足社区的教师开发新的在线教育资源，向公众提供有关寄生虫的教育。 该项目生成的所有标本图像都将用于开发用于寄生虫的快速识别工具，该工具将通过Internet和智能手机应用程序访问，并与Idigbio（idigbio.org）共享。 TPT-TCN还将开发和实施专注于自然历史收藏中数据的本科教学模块。 这些模块将被传播到美国各地的学术机构，并在线获得。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并使用基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的影响审查标准，被认为值得通过评估来获得支持。