Disentangling the effects of demography, dispersal and biotic interactions on population and community response to global change (BIOPIC)

减缓生物多样性的迅速丧失是21世纪最重要的挑战之一。为了设计和测试适当的政策和管理战略，我们需要改进的生物多样性模型，以便对潜在物种和社区对全球环境变化的反应进行定量估计。物种的范围主要受到物种的生理(非生物)耐受性的限制，这是由它们的基本生态位描述的。此外，人口统计过程、扩散和与其他物种的生物相互作用正在塑造物种分布，导致实现的生态位。了解这些驱动因素之间的复杂相互作用对于对新环境做出强有力的生物多样性预测至关重要。相关的物种分布模型被广泛用于预测生物多样性的反应，但也仍然受到批评，因为它们无法适当地理清形成物种生态位的非生物和生物驱动因素。因此，最近的发展集中在(I)将人口学和扩散纳入物种分布模型，以及(Ii)纳入生物相互作用。然而，这些模型的许多方面仍未得到充分探索，例如，需要纳入模型的过程细节，以及所代表的过程的尺度依赖性和时空变化等。此外，我们仍然缺乏一个框架，以一种通用的方式完全整合所有这些过程，以便它适用于和适应大量物种。在这里，我建议成立一个研究小组，开发一个综合的建模框架，能够理清人口、扩散和生物相互作用在形成物种生态位方面的复杂作用，并评估它们对种群和社区对全球环境变化的反应的影响。该框架及其单一组成部分将使用模拟和经验数据的组合进行验证，并将在鸟类社区进行操作和测试，其中将使用贝叶斯推理以一种新的方式合成多个数据源。特别是，该项目将侧重于五个主要研究目标，旨在(1)提高我们对生活史和环境如何形成扩散的理解，(2)提高我们对生活史和人口学如何塑造物种生态位的理解，(3)提高我们对生物相互作用如何塑造物种生态位的理解，(4)开发和实施多物种动态分布模型，以及(5)为欧洲鸟类制定新的生物多样性情景。总体而言，拟议项目将改善基于模型的生物多样性评估的科学基础，并通过提供理论和概念上的进展以及确定生物多样性模型开发和应用的实际要求和指导方针，提高大空间尺度生物多样性预测的可靠性。

Mitigating rapid biodiversity loss is one of the most vital challenges of the 21st century. For designing and testing adequate policy and management strategies, we need improved biodiversity models that allow deriving quantitative estimates of potential species and community response to global environmental change. Species ranges are primarily limited by the physiological (abiotic) tolerance of the species, described by their fundamental niche. Additionally, demographic processes, dispersal, and biotic interactions with other species are shaping species distributions, resulting in the realised niche. Understanding the complex interplay between these drivers is vital for making robust biodiversity predictions to novel environments. Correlative species distribution models have been widely used to predict biodiversity response but also remain criticised, as they are not able to properly disentangle the abiotic and biotic drivers shaping species niches. Recent developments have thus focussed on (i) integrating demography and dispersal into species distribution models, and on (ii) integrating biotic interactions. Yet, many aspects of these models remain under-explored, for example, the required process detail to be incorporated in the models as well as the scale dependence and the spatial and temporal variation of the represented processes among others. Also, we are still missing a framework that fully integrates all these processes in a generic way, such that it is applicable and adaptable to a large number of species. Here, I propose setting up a research group that develops an integrated modelling framework able to disentangle the complex roles of demography, dispersal and biotic interactions in shaping species niches, and assess their effects on population and community response to global environmental change. The framework and its single components will be validated using a mix of simulated and empirical data, and it will be operationalized and tested for avian communities, for which multiple data sources will be synthesized in a novel way using Bayesian inference. In particular, the project will focus on five key research objectives aimed at (1) improving our understanding how life history and environment shape dispersal, (2) improving our understanding how life history and demography shape species niches, (3) improving our understanding how biotic interactions shape species niches, (4) developing and operationalizing multi-species dynamic distribution models, and (5) developing new biodiversity scenarios for European birds. Overall, the proposed project will improve the scientific basis for model-based biodiversity assessments and increase reliability of biodiversity predictions for broad spatial scales by providing both theoretical and conceptual advancements and by defining practical requirements and guidelines for the development and application of biodiversity models.