Collaborative Research: The Drivers and Role of Immigration in the Dynamics of the Largest Population of Weddell Seals in Antarctica under Changing Conditions

第1部分：非技术描述这是一项长期种群动态研究（1978年至今）的延续，该研究对南极洲埃里伯斯湾的威德尔海豹进行了密集的标记-再捕获标记。过去的工作已经成为大型动物种群研究的全球模式。结果表明，在繁殖、丰度和种群组成方面，每年都有很大的变化。该项目将增加评估移民母海豹在人口统计学中的作用、评估总体种群动态年度变化的可能驱动因素、评估移民母海豹与当地出生母海豹之间的遗传差异，并记录罗斯海地区海豹种群之间的基因流动模式。这些新的方面将集中在对海豹种群结构、功能和遗传学的理解上，并为预测海豹种群如何应对环境变化提供关键信息。基因方法的加入将为多个国家的多个研究威德尔海豹的小组提供更多的可用数据。这项工作包括一个面向教师、大学研究生和本科生的早期职业科学家培训计划，以及一个明确的数据共享计划。这项研究与积极的教育和推广计划、社交媒体、网站、教育资源、视频和高调的公开讲座活动相结合。这个非正式的科学教育项目将扩大该项目在制作和提供短视频方面的成功努力，这些短视频迄今已被观看了160多万次。此外，教育计划还将增加新的主题，如利用基因组学了解海豹，以及海豹如何应对不断变化的世界，这将是一本关于该项目对威德尔海豹长期研究的多媒体增强电子书，该电子书将在项目早期免费向公众开放。对于野生物种种群，特别是高纬度地区的野生物种种群将如何对未来的环境条件作出反应，需要可靠的预测。这项研究将使用长期人口研究计划的战略延伸，该计划自1978年以来每年对埃里伯斯湾威德尔海豹的种群进行研究，以帮助满足这一需求。最近对研究种群的分析表明，在繁殖、丰度和种群组成方面，每年都有很强的变化。每年加入人口的新移民母亲的数量最近有所增长，以至于大多数新母亲现在都是移民。尽管移民人数不断增加，但移民的人口重要性和地理来源尚不清楚。该研究将(1)增加关于移民数量年度变化驱动因素的新信息，(2)比较并结合移民女性及其后代与当地出生的女性的生长率和人口统计学作用的信息，以及(3)增加基因组分析，以量化研究种群和罗斯海其他种群的遗传变异水平和基因流动。该项目将继续对埃里伯斯湾的种群进行长期监测，并利用标记-再捕获分析、随机种群模型和基因组分析相结合，描述种群动态和移民的作用。这项研究将继续为其他科学团队提供个别海豹的详细数据，教育和指导下一代生态学家，介绍两名早期职业女性科学家参与南极研究，并将基因组学方法加入到埃里伯斯湾威德尔海豹的长期种群研究中。这项研究将得到一个强有力的培训计划和一个非正式的科学教育计划的补充。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Part 1: Non-technical descriptionThis is a continuation of a long-term population dynamics study (1978-present) using an intensive mark-recapture tagging of Weddell seals in Erebus Bay, Antarctica. Past work has become a global model for population studies of large animals. Results have documented strong annual variation in reproduction, abundance, and population composition. This program will add components to evaluate the demographic role of immigrant mothers, evaluate possible drivers of annual variation in overall population dynamics, assess genetic differences between immigrant and locally born mothers, and document patterns of gene flow among seal colonies in the Ross Sea region. These new aspects will focus on understanding of population structure, function, and genetics and provide key information for predicting how the seal population will respond to environmental change. The addition of genetic approaches will advance available data for multiple groups in multiple countries working on Weddell Seals. This work includes an early career scientists training program for faculty university graduate and undergraduate students and well as a defined program for data sharing. The research is paired with active education and outreach programs, social media, websites, educational resources, videos and high-profile public lecture activities. The informal science education program will expand on the project’s successful efforts at producing and delivering short-form videos that have been viewed over 1.6 million times to date. In addition, the education program will add new topics such as learning about seals using genomics and how seals respond to a changing world to a multimedia-enhanced electronic book about the project’s long-term research on Weddell seals, which will be freely available to the public early in the project.Part 2: Technical description Reliable predictions are needed for how populations of wild species, especially those at high latitudes, will respond to future environmental conditions. This study will use a strategic extension of the long-term demographic research program that has been conducted annually on the Erebus Bay population of Weddell seals since 1978 to help meet that need. Recent analyses of the study population indicate strong annual variation in reproduction, abundance, and population composition. The number of new immigrant mothers that join the population each year has recently grown such that most new mothers are now immigrants. Despite the growing number of immigrants, the demographic importance and geographic origins of immigrants are unknown. The research will (1) add new information on drivers of annual variation in immigrant numbers, (2) compare and combine information on the vital rates and demographic role of immigrant females and their offspring with that of locally born females, and (3) add genomic analyses that will quantify levels of genetic variation in and gene flow among the study population and other populations in the Ross Sea. The project will continue the long-term monitoring of the population at Erebus Bay and characterize population dynamics and the role of immigration using a combination of mark-recapture analyses, stochastic population modeling, and genomic analyses. The study will continue to provide detailed data on individual seals to other science teams, educate and mentor individuals in the next generation of ecologists, introduce two early-career, female scientists to Antarctic research, and add genomics approaches to the long-term population study of Erebus Bay Weddell seals. The research will be complemented with a robust program of training and an informal science education program.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.