Sexual selection, life history and ecological immunology

性选择、生活史和生态免疫学

• 批准号: RGPIN-2014-05579
• 负责人: Kelly, Clint
• 金额: $ 1.97万
• 依托单位: Université du Québec à Montréal
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2018-01-01 至 2019-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=655264
• 关键词: Sexual; selection; life; history; ecological

Individuals clearly benefit from combating parasites and pathogens. A central problem in evolutionary biology, however, is explaining why hosts remain susceptible to disease and why immune responses vary across populations, species and environments. We are now realizing that much of this variation is rooted in the costs of immunity: fighting disease imposes a significant drain on an individual's resource pool that requires investment in immune function to trade off against other critical fitness components (e.g. growth and reproduction). Although investment strategies are dependent on individual factors (e.g. nutritional condition, sex, and genotype), mating system, social/mating environment, and evolutionary history, they have not received the empirical attention that they deserve. Our research will identify the role that these factors play in determining an individual's resource allocation strategy and explain why immune responses vary across populations, species and situations. Specifically, we will identify the sex-specific evolutionary costs to reproduction (and other fitness traits) of evolving an immune system. We will also describe the interaction between individual quality and social environment during development on allocation to adult immunity and other fitness-related traits. Our research will elucidate the sex-specific genetic costs to reproduction (and other fitness traits) of deploying the immune system. Finally, we will explain how male attractiveness mediates trade-offs between immunity and reproduction, and whether mate choice provides females with material or genetic (i.e. genetically better offspring) fitness benefits. Achieving these research goals will advance and transform our understanding of immunology. The proposed research will train 3 new PhD and one new M.Sc. (as well as several B.Sc.) students in the concepts and processes of evolutionary ecology and provide them with particular expertise and skills in state-of-the art field, laboratory, analytical and statistical techniques.

个人显然受益于与寄生虫和病原体的斗争。然而，进化生物学的一个核心问题是解释为什么宿主仍然容易感染疾病，以及为什么不同种群、物种和环境的免疫反应不同。我们现在意识到，这种差异在很大程度上源于免疫的成本：对抗疾病会消耗大量的个人资源，这需要在免疫功能上进行投资，以抵消其他关键的健康因素（如生长和繁殖）。尽管投资策略依赖于个体因素（如营养状况、性别和基因型）、交配系统、社会/交配环境和进化历史，但它们并没有得到应有的经验关注。我们的研究将确定这些因素在决定个体资源分配策略中所起的作用，并解释为什么免疫反应在人群、物种和情况下有所不同。具体来说，我们将确定进化免疫系统的生殖（和其他适应性特征）的性别特异性进化成本。我们还将描述个体素质和社会环境在发育过程中对成人免疫和其他健康相关特征的分配的相互作用。我们的研究将阐明部署免疫系统对生殖（和其他适应性特征）的性别特异性遗传成本。最后，我们将解释男性吸引力如何在免疫和繁殖之间进行权衡，以及配偶选择是否为女性提供了物质或遗传（即遗传上更好的后代）健康益处。实现这些研究目标将促进和改变我们对免疫学的理解。该项目将培养3名新的博士和1名新的硕士（以及几名学士）学生，学习进化生态学的概念和过程，并为他们提供最先进的领域、实验室、分析和统计技术方面的特殊专业知识和技能。