International Research Fellowship Program: Effects of Climate Change on a Marine Invertebrate

Fangue国际研究奖学金计划使美国科学家和工程师能够在国外进行9至24个月的研究。该计划的奖项将提供联合研究的机会，并利用国外独特或互补的设施、专业知识和实验条件。该奖项将支持Nann A.Fangue博士为期24个月的研究奖学金，与墨西哥Ensenada墨西哥下加利福尼亚大学海洋研究所(IIO-UABC)的Eugenio Carpio-Ituarte博士以及加州大学圣巴巴拉分校海洋科学研究所的Gretchen E.Hofmann博士合作。该项目由国际科学与工程办公室的美洲项目提供支持。该项目的中心目标是研究海洋无脊椎动物在应对气候变化时的生理表现。在接下来的几十年里，科学家们预计，随着全球气候变化，物种入侵的数量和物种范围分布的变化会越来越多。在气候变化带来的新环境中，确定设定物种范围边界和影响生理表现的过程和机制至关重要。紫色海胆，紫海胆，从不列颠哥伦比亚省的温哥华岛到墨西哥的蓬塔尤金尼亚，分布范围很广。此外，海胆的幼虫扩散和定居阶段受到全球变暖情景中预计会发生变化的因素的严重影响。我将研究海胆胚胎和幼虫对温度和酸化应激源的反应，以及这些应激源在生态相关水平上的组合(基于当前的气候变化预测)。重点将放在物种范围最南端的种群(Punta Eugenia)上，因为全球变化的直接后果之一是，由于热胁迫，物种分布可能向两极转移，即物种丧失的“热点”。此外，还将从生物地理模式的角度对分布范围内的多个海胆种群进行调查。利用生理表现和存活测量的结果，以及利用基因芯片和定量PCR进行转录组分析，我希望能够预测气候变化对海胆幼体生理性能的潜在影响。此外，通过确定在海胆对温度和酸化应激源的反应中可能重要的不同的基因表达模式(转录本丰度和物种)，PI将有助于推进关于气候变化背景下的生态相关基因的假说。此外，协同应激源的使用将产生一个重要的数据集，确定海洋无脊椎动物对温度和酸化的生理反应。

0700551FangueThe International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Nann A. Fangue to work with Dr. Eugenio Carpizo-Ituarte of the Instituto de Investigciones Oceanologicas of the Universidad Autonoma de Baja California (IIO-UABC), Ensenada Mexico and with Dr. Gretchen E. Hofmann, Marine Science Institute of the University of California at Santa Barbara. Support for this project is provided by the Office of International Science and Engineering's Americas Program.The central aim of this project is to study the physiological performance of a marine invertebrate in response to climate change. In the coming decades, scientists expect increasing numbers of species invasions and shifts in species range distributions in response to global climate change. It is critical to determine the processes and mechanisms that set species range boundaries and influence physiological performance in novel environments presented by climate change. The purple sea urchin, Strongylocentrotus purpuratus, has a broad distribution range from Vancouver Island, British Columbia to Punta Eugenia, Mexico. As well, sea urchins have larval dispersal and settlement phases that are heavily influenced by factors predicted to change in global warming scenarios. I will investigate the response of sea urchin embryos and larvae to temperature and acidification stressors, as well as these stressors in combination at ecologically relevant levels (based on current climate change predictions). Emphasis will be placed on the southern-most population (Punta Eugenia) of the species range because one of the direct consequences of global change is a possible shift poleward in species distributions, or "hot spots" of species loss, as a result of thermal stress. In addition, multiple sea urchin populations from across their distribution range will also be investigated from a biogeographical patterning perspective. Using results obtained from physiological performance and survival measures as well as transcriptome profiling with cDNA microarrays and quantitative PCR, I hope to make predictions about the potential impacts of climate change on the physiological performance of larval sea urchins. In addition, by identifying distinct patterns of gene expression (transcript abundance and species) that may be important in the sea urchin's response to temperature and acidification stressors, the PI will help to advance hypotheses about ecologically relevant genes in the context of climate change. Furthermore, the use of synergistic stressors will generate an important data set identifying physiological responses to temperature and acidification in a marine invertebrate.