NSF PRFB FY 2023: Genetic, Physiological, and Environmental Drivers of Plant-Pollinator Niche Dynamics Across Scales of Biological Organization

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This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2023, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment, and Phenotypes. This project represents an examination of pollinator foraging patterns using a wide variety of biological techniques. The fellow will utilize the pollen collected by individual bees in nature to understand of the flowers visited by these bees during the course of the bee’s natural foraging. By uncovering how environmental and biological factors influence variation in pollinator foraging behavior, this project will improve scientists’ ability to predict how environmental changes may influence pollinator biodiversity and pollination behaviors. Additionally, the fellow will engage in efforts to improve the accessibility of field-based research to scientists of diverse identities and backgrounds. She will work to implement field safety standards for researchers in professional settings and establish community science efforts to include non-professional science enthusiasts in the exciting world of native pollinators.This project will apply an emerging molecular tool ¬– pollen DNA metabarcoding – to measure variation in niche breadth and niche turnover among individual pollinators along a natural temperature and geographic gradient. In addition to examining environmental variation, the fellow will test for phenotypic (pollinator body size) and genotypic (microsatellite markers) drivers of these niche characteristics, focusing specifically on bumble bees as a model system for pollinator molecular ecology. With this data, she will examine whether individual-level niche dynamics can be used to improve the predictive ability of models simulating community-level patterns of species loss. The inclusion of individual-level niche dynamics in network disassembly models will be a novel extension of stochastic coextinction modeling that has the potential to shed light on apparent contradictions in the structure of mutualistic networks whereby frequently observed patterns of interactions (e.g., nestedness) do not follow the expectations of theories like competitive exclusion. In addition to expanding her molecular and computational skills, the fellow aims to improve accessibility and safety in field work by developing workshops and resources to start conversations about field safety among researchers at all career stages. She also plans to establish a pollinator monitoring program at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, TX to engage community members and support pollinator conservation through accessible science.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.