CAREER: Unraveling the evolutionary history of toothed whale acoustic communication

职业：揭开齿鲸声音通讯的进化史

• 批准号: 2335991
• 负责人: Laura May Collado
• 金额: $ 115.65万
• 依托单位: University of Vermont & State Agricultural College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-04-15 至 2029-03-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2335991&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Unraveling; evolutionary; history; toothed

Toothed whales (dolphins, porpoises, and relatives) are not only among the most acoustically specialized groups of vertebrates, but their communication is potentially one of the most complex in the animal kingdom. This is because toothed whales are open-ended vocal learners, meaning they learn new vocalizations throughout their lifetime. Additionally, their unique sound generator allows them to produce a rich repertoire of acoustic signals. Although toothed whale acoustic signals have been studied extensively for over 70 years, the scope of their vocal repertoire and the underlying factors shaping their repertoire evolution remains largely unknown. This represents an important gap in knowledge that limits our ability to discover the mechanisms underlying the evolution of animal acoustic communication. Furthermore, the question of how diverse toothed whale vocal repertoires are is relevant to the study of animal ecology and behavior, ocean health, and the global economy. Toothed whales are apex predators and ecosystem engineers that contribute to the maintenance of a healthy ocean and local economies. Because they rely almost entirely on sound for their survival, they are vulnerable to human activities that generate underwater noise. By quantifying the makeup of their vocal repertoire and understanding their evolutionary and ecological drivers, this study can improve our ability to monitor their populations and predict the impacts of an increasingly warmer and noisier ocean, particularly in areas where they serve an economic role. The study integrates artificial intelligence and machine learning approaches to quantify toothed whales’ vocal repertoires with phylogenetic tools and field studies, to test hypotheses about the role of social and environmental factors in repertoire diversity and composition. Across the five-year period of the award, the PI will train 105 undergraduates in bioacoustics, animal behavior, and soundscape ecology through a semester Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CURE), ten undergraduate students through a 3-week paid field research experience, two Ph.D. students, one technician, and one postdoc. The PI’s goal is to recruit a diverse student cohort to work in a deeply collaborative format to help students develop feelings of confidence, belonging, equity, and community. By intentionally creating a synergistic environment for exchange of ideas and research opportunities, the program will foster innovation and creativity, empowering students to select careers in STEM and broader job market opportunities within and outside academia. The contribution of this research program is significant because it will generate novel computational approaches with transferable applications to the study of animal communication. This grant was co-funded by the Systematics & Biodiversity Science Cluster, Division of Environmental Biology, and the Behavioral Systems Cluster, Division of Integrative Organismal Systems, Directorate of Biological Sciences.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.

齿鲸（海豚、鼠海豚及其亲戚）不仅是脊椎动物中声音最特殊的群体之一，而且它们的交流可能是动物王国中最复杂的交流之一。这是因为齿鲸是开放式的发声学习者，这意味着它们一生都在学习新的发声方式。此外，它们独特的声音发生器使它们能够产生丰富的声音信号。尽管齿鲸的声音信号已经被广泛研究了70多年，但它们的声音曲目范围和影响它们曲目演变的潜在因素在很大程度上仍然未知。这代表了一个重要的知识缺口，限制了我们发现动物声学通信进化机制的能力。此外，齿鲸声音的多样性问题与动物生态学和行为、海洋健康和全球经济的研究有关。齿鲸是顶级掠食者和生态系统工程师，为维护健康的海洋和当地经济做出了贡献。因为它们几乎完全依靠声音生存，它们很容易受到人类活动产生的水下噪音的影响。通过量化它们发声曲目的组成，了解它们的进化和生态驱动因素，这项研究可以提高我们监测它们数量的能力，并预测日益温暖和嘈杂的海洋的影响，特别是在它们发挥经济作用的地区。该研究整合了人工智能和机器学习方法，通过系统发育工具和实地研究来量化齿鲸的声乐曲目，以测试关于社会和环境因素在曲目多样性和组成中的作用的假设。在五年的奖励期内，PI将通过一个学期的基于课程的本科生研究经验（CURE）培训105名本科生，包括生物声学、动物行为和声景生态学，10名本科生通过为期三周的带薪实地研究经验，两名博士生，一名技术员和一名博士后。PI的目标是招募一个多元化的学生群体，以一种深度合作的形式工作，帮助学生培养自信、归属感、公平和社区的感觉。通过有意为思想交流和研究机会创造一个协同环境，该计划将促进创新和创造力，使学生能够选择STEM领域的职业，并在学术界内外获得更广泛的就业市场机会。这个研究项目的贡献是重要的，因为它将产生新的计算方法，并将其应用于动物交流的研究。该基金由环境生物学部系统学与生物多样性科学集群和生物科学理事会综合有机体系统学部行为系统集群共同资助。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。