Metacommunity dynamics at multiple scales

我的长期研究目标是确定在多个空间和时间尺度上决定群落结构和动态的因素。我通过元社区概念的视角来处理这个问题，通过调查当地社区之间的扩散如何潜在地影响当地的非生物和生物环境过程。在接下来的5年里，我将通过整合我过去研究的4个流派来转变我的研究策略：时间动力学、宿主-共生体相互作用、小型哺乳动物群落动力学以及基于DNA的物种识别和生物信息学。我将把重点放在一个研究系统上，该系统结合了我过去在多个尺度上的元群落生态学方面的优势，但将它们应用于一个新的系统：嵌套在多种寄主物种的小型哺乳动物元群落矩阵中的微生物元群落。*我的短期研究目标有两个：1)确定这样一个系统的结构过程，这是阿尔冈昆省公园长期监测研究的一部分；2)通过明确地在该系统内的几个尺度上操纵扩散来实验验证这些模式。这一建议将量化(元)群落动态的两个主要驱动因素的影响：物种通过当地环境条件进行分类和在景观内的地点之间扩散。寄主-微生物组相互作用的复杂性在分析中发挥了作用，因为局部环境效应可以受到季节性、寄主物种身份和寄主-个体差异(如寄主内的时间动态和相互作用网络)的中介或影响。此外，微生物群聚散可受寄主群聚扩散的中介或影响。这些研究的结果将与元社区结构元素的结果进行比较，元社区结构是一种数据密集度较低但经常使用的方法。最后，观察性研究将通过创建微生物种群数量大幅减少的宿主个体并监测它们的再定殖率，来实验性地确定共生体的集合群落分散率。这些研究将由一名有4个项目的博士生和3名硕士学生完成。微生物无处不在，对高等生物的健康很重要。一种明确考虑所有不同重要尺度的元社区方法是必要的，这一提议是分析自然社区内这些动态的重要步骤。除了更多的实验研究外，这一结果还将导致更多的应用研究，调查在阿尔冈昆省公园的小型哺乳动物中检测到的微生物物种与内寄生虫之间的相互作用。在这种情况下，更有必要采用元群落方法，因为人类诱导的栖息地碎片化会影响宿主-病原体-微生物群的相互作用。

My long-term research goal is to identify the factors that determine community structure and dynamics at multiple spatial and temporal scales. I approach this question through the lens of the metacommunity concept by investigating how dispersal between local communities could potentially influence local abiotic and biotic environmental processes. In the next 5 years, I will shift my research strategy by consolidating 4 streams of my past research: temporal dynamics, host-symbiont interactions, small mammal metacommunity dynamics, and DNA-based species identification and bioinformatics. I will focus on a study system that combines my past strengths in metacommunity ecology at multiple scales, but will apply them to a novel system: microbial metacommunities nested within a matrix of small mammal metacommunity of multiple host species. ***My short-term research goals are then 2-fold: 1) identify the structuring processes of such a system that is part of a long-term monitoring study in Algonquin Provincial Park, and 2) to experimentally verify these patterns by explicitly manipulating dispersal at several scales within this system. This proposal will quantify the effect of two of the main drivers of (meta-) community dynamics: species sorting through local environmental conditions and dispersal between sites within the landscape. The complexity of the host-microbiome interactions comes into play in the analyses because the local environmental effects can be mediated or influenced by seasonality, host species identity, and host-individual differences such as within-host temporal dynamics and interaction networks. In addition, microbiome metacommunity dispersal can be mediated or influenced by host metacommunity dispersal. The results of these studies will be compared to the results obtained with the Elements of Metacommunity Structure, a method that is less data intensive, but often used. Finally, the observational studies will lead to experimentally determining symbiont metacommunity dispersal rates by creating host individuals with strongly reduced microbiome populations and monitoring their recolonization rates. These studies will be done by a PhD student with 4 projects, and 3 MSc students.***Microorganisms are ubiquitous and important for the health of higher organisms. A metacommunity approach that explicitly considers all the different important scales is necessary, and this proposal is an important step in analysing these dynamics within a natural community. In addition to more experimental studies, the results will also lead to more applied studies investigating the interactions between microbiome species and endoparasites, which have been detected in the small mammals of Algonquin Provincial Park. A metacommunity approach in this context is even more warranted, because human induced habitat fragmentation can influence host-pathogen-microbiome interactions.*****