Collaborative Research: Discovering genomic and developmental mechanisms that underlie sensory innovations critical to adaptive diversification

所有动物都必须感知它们的环境和其他有机体，以寻找食物，避免威胁，并找到伴侣。一些个体比其他个体更有效地找到食物和配偶的能力，可以为它们留下更多的后代提供机会。然而，尽管多种先进的感觉系统可能会赋予它们优势，但它们很少在同一物种中进化，这表明发展几种专门的感觉是有生理限制的。这个项目聚焦于热带蝙蝠的不同群体，在这些物种中，不同物种进化出了敏锐的、特殊的听力、超敏感的眼睛、闻到微妙的植物化学物质的能力，或者高度发达的犁鼻系统(被认为有助于交配和社会等级)。该项目将比较150多种蝙蝠中与视觉、听觉、嗅觉和犁鼻系统有关的大约2000个基因。为了找出这些基因中的一些如何有助于发展不同的感觉系统，他们的行动将在实验室进行研究。这项研究将揭示特定基因在获得特殊感觉方面的作用，测试头部的大小是否限制了一个物种可以拥有的特殊感觉结构的数量，并发现感觉适应如何随着时间的推移促进物种的多样性。这个项目将揭示一个蝙蝠大家族中听觉、视觉、嗅觉和犁鼻系统的基因和结构的进化，这些超级家族的特征是与特定饮食相关的不同感觉适应。基因进化的分析将被用来检验这一假说，即感官创新是通过基因复制和正向选择产生的。从野外收集的组织中测量基因表达，以及在发育中的胚胎中表达关键蝙蝠基因的实验将被用来阐明基因是如何形成适应性感觉结构的。对感官结构大小的详细测量的比较分析将评估感觉系统之间的权衡，以及这些系统可能限制饮食或物种多样性的方式。将使用最先进的方法来量化基因和特征进化与物种多样性之间的关系，以发现随着时间的推移，感觉适应对物种多样性的影响。这项研究将阐明基因组、胚胎发育期间以及有助于物种成功适应不断具有挑战性的环境的解剖结构中的主要生物学力量。

All animals must sense their environment and other organisms to find food, avoid threats, and find partners. The ability of some individuals to locate food and mates more effectively than others can open opportunities for them to leave many more descendants. And yet, multiple advanced sensory systems seldom evolve in the same species despite the advantages they may confer, suggesting there are physical limits to developing several specialized senses. This project focuses on a diverse group of tropical bats in which various species evolved acute, specialized hearing, supersensitive eyes, the ability to smell subtle plant chemicals, or highly developed vomeronasal systems (thought to contribute to mating and social hierarchy). This project will compare approximately 2000 genes involved in vision, hearing, olfaction and the vomeronasal system in more than 150 bat species. To find out how some of these genes contribute to developing distinct sensory systems, their actions will be studied in the lab. This research will uncover the role of specific genes in the acquisition of specialized senses, test whether the size of the head limits the number of specialized sensory structures a species can have, and discover how sensory adaptations contribute to the diversity of species through time.This project will uncover the evolution of genes and structures of the auditory, visual, and olfactory and vomeronasal systems in a large superfamily of bats characterized by diverse sensory adaptations associated with specific diets. Analyses of gene evolution will be used to test the hypothesis that sensory innovations arise through gene duplication and positive selection. Measurements of gene expression from tissues collected in the field, and experiments to express key bat genes in developing embryos will be used to elucidate how genes shape adaptive sensory structures. Comparative analyses of detailed measurements of the size of sensory structures will evaluate trade-offs between sensory systems and the way these may limit diversity of diets or species. State-of-the art methods to quantify relationships between gene and trait evolution and species diversity will be used to discover the impact of sensory adaptation on species diversity through time. This research will illuminate the main biological forces in the genome, during embryonic development, and in anatomical structures that contribute to the success of species in adapting to their ever-challenging environment.