SGER: Effects of El Nino on Darwin's Finches

该奖助金将用于动员对今年冬季在太平洋中部形成的厄尔尼诺事件作出快速反应。格兰特博士和他的学生研究加拉帕戈斯群岛的鸟类已有20多年了。据预测，这次厄尔尼诺现象是有记录以来最大的一次，预计将导致加拉帕戈斯群岛上的加拉帕戈斯雀的繁殖季节大幅延长。这种长期的有利条件可能对研究人群的人口规模和人口统计学产生巨大影响。格兰特博士将测试以下假设：a)生活史特征的遗传能力，b)杂交鸟类年龄特异性适应性的变化，c)近亲繁殖鸟类的适应性，d)最近经历了人口统计学和可能的遗传瓶颈的两个最稀有种群的遗传结构，e)通过观察鸟巢中的成年鸟来估计幼鸟的父系关系。这项研究可能为与快速变化的环境条件的进化反应相关的机制提供新的见解。

Grant 9806449 This award will be used to mobilize a quick response to the El Nino event that has developed in the central Pacific this winter. Dr. Grant and his students have been studying the birds of the Galapagos Islands for more than 20 years. It is expected that this El Nino event, predicted to be one of the largest on record, will result in a dramatically prolonged breeding season for Galapagos finches on the Galapagos Islands. This extended period of favorable conditions may have dramatic effects on the population size and demography of the study populations. Dr. Grant will test hypotheses concerning a) the heritability of life history traits, b) variation in age-specific fitness of hybrid birds, c) the fitness of inbred birds, d) the genetic structure of the two rarest populations which have recently experienced demographic and possibly genetic bottlenecks, and e) paternity of young birds estimated by observations of adults at nests. This study may provide novel insights to the mechanisms associated with evolutionary response to rapidly changing environmental conditions.