ORCC: Migratory organisms in a changing world: from the molecular basis of migratory timing to models predicting the effects of specific conservation strategies.

动物对它们的许多行为进行计时，以符合环境的特点。气候变化正在影响这种同步性，这种不匹配将对我们的生态系统产生级联效应。这个项目将研究鸣鸟的迁徙时间和资源可获得性之间的联系。繁殖地的资源(例如，对养育幼虫很重要的昆虫)的峰值每年都在提早。鸣禽可能无法对这些变化做出反应，从而改变它们迁徙的时间，使其更早到达繁殖地。这种不匹配不仅让研究人员感到担忧，联邦和州野生动物机构也在努力为这种现象的下游后果做准备。因此，该项目是与野生动物机构合作设计的。研究结果将帮助政策制定者评估现有的保护政策，并测试新的候鸟管理计划。还计划沿移民路线开展当地宣传活动(例如，将北美和南美洲的儿童连接起来的移民教育方案)。该项目还将招募STEM中代表性不足的群体，并将其纳入研究和推广计划。可塑性和适应性可以使移民提前迁徙时间，但对这些机制及其分子基础的直接估计很少，仅限于少数邻近人口。该项目将开始利用几个学科(例如动物运动生态学、基因组学和计算机建模)的最新工具和来自广泛地理范围的数据来填补这一知识空白。具体地说，(1)可塑性和(2)对迁徙时机的适应将被估计，(3)这一特征的分子基础将被检验。然后，对可塑性和适应能力的估计将被整合到预测人口将如何应对气候变化的模型中，并为这一群体提出具体的保护战略。为这项工作选择的物种已经显示出它们在迁徙时间上的进步，但在更靠北繁殖的种群中，这些进步更弱。这一趋势可能与这样一个事实有关，即繁殖场的环境条件对北方育种者来说更难预测，这是本项目将解决的一个问题。这个项目的结果将与许多领域相关(例如，遗传学、行为和进化)，预测框架可以用于其他系统、特征和环境变化。该奖项反映了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。

Animals time many of their behaviors to coincide with features of the environment. Climate change is affecting this synchrony and this mismatch will have cascading effects on our ecosystems. This project will examine the connection between migratory timing and resource availability in a songbird. Resources on the breeding grounds (e.g., insects important for raising young) are peaking earlier each year. Songbirds may not be able to respond to these changes, modifying the timing of their migration to arrive on the breeding grounds earlier. This mismatch is not only of concern to researchers; federal and state wildlife agencies are also trying to prepare for the downstream consequences of this phenomenon. Accordingly, this project was designed in collaboration with wildlife agencies. Results will help policy makers assess existing protection policies and test new management plans for migratory songbirds. Local outreach along the migratory flyway is also planned (e.g., educational programming on migration that will connect children across North and South America). Underrepresented groups in STEM will also be recruited in this project and included in both the research and outreach plans.Plasticity and adaptation could allow migrants to advance their migratory timing, but direct estimates of these mechanisms and their molecular basis are rare and restricted to a small number of proximate populations. This project will begin filling this knowledge gap, using state-of-the-art tools from several disciplines (e.g., animal movement ecology, genomics and computer modeling) and data from a broad geographic scale. Specifically, (1) plasticity and (2) adaptation for migratory timing will be estimated and (3) the molecular basis of this trait will be examined. Estimates of plasticity and adaptation will then be (4) integrated into models predicting how populations will respond to climate change and specific conservation strategies being proposed for this group. The species chosen for this work already shows advances in their migratory timing, but these advances are weaker in populations that breed further north. This trend could relate to the fact that environmental conditions on the breeding grounds are less predictable for northern breeders and is a question this project will address. Results from this project will be relevant to many fields (e.g., genetics, behavior and evolution) and the predictive framework can be used for other systems, traits and environmental variation.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.