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)的继续，该研究使用了对南极洲埃里伯斯湾的韦德尔海豹进行密集的标记-重新捕获标记。过去的工作已经成为大型动物种群研究的全球模型。结果证明，在繁殖力、丰度和种群构成方面存在着强烈的年度变化。该计划将增加一些内容，以评估移民母亲的人口统计角色，评估总体人口动态每年变化的可能驱动因素，评估移民母亲和当地出生母亲之间的遗传差异，并记录罗斯海地区海豹群体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，并为预测海豹种群将如何应对环境变化提供关键信息。基因方法的增加将为多个国家的多个小组提供研究韦德尔海豹的可用数据。这项工作包括针对教师、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外展项目、社交媒体、网站、教育资源、视频和备受瞩目的公开演讲活动相结合。非正式科学教育计划将扩大该项目在制作和提供短片方面的成功努力，到目前为止，这些短片已经被观看了超过160万次。此外，该教育计划将在关于该项目对韦德尔海豹的长期研究的多媒体增强电子书中增加新的主题，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。这本书将在项目早期向公众免费提供。第二部分：技术描述需要可靠的预测，以确定野生物种，特别是高纬度物种的种群将如何应对未来的环境条件。这项研究将使用自1978年以来每年对Erebus Bay的韦德尔海豹种群进行的长期人口研究计划的战略性扩展，以帮助满足这一需求。最近对研究种群的分析表明，在繁殖力、丰度和种群构成方面存在着强烈的年度变化。最近，每年加入人口行列的新移民母亲的数量不断增加，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，但移民在人口统计学上的重要性和地理来源尚不得而知。这项研究将(1)增加关于移民数量每年变化的驱动因素的新信息，(2)比较和结合关于移民女性及其后代与当地出生女性的生命率和人口角色的信息，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水平。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-重新捕获分析、随机种群建模和基因组分析相结合的方法来描述种群动态和移民的作用。这项研究将继续向其他科学团队提供关于海豹个体的详细数据，教育和指导下一代生态学家的个人，将两名职业生涯早期的女科学家引入南极研究，并将基因组学方法添加到埃里伯斯湾韦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。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。

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.