NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology: The Microbiome as a Facilitator of Adaptive Plasticity under Rapid Environmental Change

该行动资助了美国国家科学基金会2022财年生物学博士后研究奖学金，研究基因组，环境和表型之间相互作用的生命规则的综合研究。该奖学金支持将以创新方式为《生活规则》领域作出贡献的研究员的研究和培训。考虑到全球气候变化的威胁，了解动物在面对环境的快速变化时如何反应和进化是很重要的。当个体根据环境条件调整其生理时，就会出现表型可塑性，这种可塑性可以帮助动物应对不断升高的温度。当动物面临高度或可变数量的环境变化时，它们可能会进化出一种增强的可塑性。此外，生活在动物胃肠道中的微生物群落（细菌，真菌等）可以影响动物生理，并可能影响其宿主对变化环境的反应能力。在这个项目中，研究员将监测变色蜥蜴在其环境温度近期迅速升高后耐热性可塑性的演变。此外，研究员将确定肠道中的微生物群落是否促进了这种适应的各个方面。这项研究将有助于阐明宿主和微生物之间的相互作用如何影响生物体对气候变化的反应，这可能有助于保护脆弱的物种。该研究员还将致力于向公众传播科学发现，同时指导来自STEM学科中代表性不足的背景的本科生进行独立研究项目。该项目将利用一项正在进行的野外进化实验，将巴拿马细长蜥蜴从凉爽的大陆环境移植到岛屿环境，岛屿环境通常比大陆祖先种群温暖得多。在这个系统中，研究员将确定在最温暖和最热变化的岛屿环境中的蜥蜴是否比在较冷环境中的蜥蜴进化出更大的耐热可塑性能力。此外，该研究员将确定肠道中的细菌分类群是否与宿主耐热性可塑性的增加有关，以及这些细菌的益生菌接种是否增加了蜥蜴在温暖岛屿环境中的可塑性和适应性。通过该项目，该研究员将获得基于实地的进化和生态实验、生理学、微生物学和计算生物学方面的专业知识。该研究员还将指导美国和巴拿马的本科生研究人员，同时协助他们在一个受欢迎的真人科学节目上展示他们的工作，该节目由众多不同的国际观众观看。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。

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2022, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment and Phenotypes. The fellowship supports research and training of the Fellow that will contribute to the area of Rules of Life in innovative ways. Given the threat of global climate change, it is important to understand how animals respond and evolve when faced with rapid changes in their environments. Phenotypic plasticity, which occurs when an individual adjusts its physiology in response to environmental conditions, can help animals deal with increasing temperatures. When animals face a high degree or variable amount of environmental change, they may evolve an increased capability for plasticity. Further, microbial communities (bacteria, fungi, etc.) that live in animal gastrointestinal tracts can influence animal physiology and could impact their host’s ability to respond to changing environments. In this project, the Fellow will monitor evolution in heat tolerance plasticity of anole lizards after recent and rapid increases to the temperature of their environment. Additionally, the Fellow will determine if microbial communities in the gut have facilitated aspects of this adaptation. This research will help elucidate how interactions between hosts and microbes shape organismal responses to changing climates, which may help protect vulnerable species. The Fellow will also work to disseminate scientific findings to the public while mentoring undergraduate students from backgrounds underrepresented in STEM disciplines on independent research projects.This project will leverage an ongoing field evolution experiment in which Panamanian slender anole lizards have been transplanted from cool, mainland environments, to island environments which are often significantly warmer than the mainland, ancestral population. In this system, the Fellow will determine whether lizards in the warmest and most thermally variable island environments have evolved a greater capacity for heat tolerance plasticity compared to lizards in cooler environments. Further, the Fellow will determine if bacterial taxa in the gut are associated with increased host heat tolerance plasticity and if probiotic inoculations of these bacteria increase lizard plasticity and fitness in warm island environments. As a result of this project, the Fellow will gain expertise in field-based evolutionary and ecological experiments, physiology, microbiology, and computational biology. The Fellow will also mentor undergraduate researchers in the United States and Panama while assisting them in presenting their work on a popular live-action science show which is viewed by a large and diverse international audience.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.