Dimensions: Collaborative Research: Do Parallel Patterns Arise from Parallel Processes?

该项目将调查海洋湖泊中发现的生物的分类、遗传和功能多样性，并调查导致这些生物多样性得失的过程。在最后一次冰川盛期之后，冰盖融化导致海平面上升，形成了海洋湖泊，淹没了世界各地数百个内陆山谷。这些海洋湖泊接种了来自周围海洋的海洋生物，然后在接下来的6000到15000年里不同程度地隔离，提供了多个独立的例子，说明环境和物种之间的相互作用如何导致物种灭绝和物种形成。研究人员将调查帕劳和巴布亚40个海洋湖泊中存在的微生物、藻类、无脊椎动物和鱼类，并通过取回保存在湖底沉积物中的生物遗骸来研究多样性如何随着时间的推移而变化。该项目将测试物种的数量、生物发挥的功能作用的多样性以及物种内的遗传多样性是否同时增加和减少；某些物种是否可以通过改变环境而大大减少多样性；湖泊的大小是否决定了其生物多样性；控制海洋生物多样性的过程是否与陆地上的类似。由于生物多样性是社会所依赖的生态系统服务的基础，社会对了解自然界中生物多样性的产生和保持的过程非常感兴趣。该项目还将有助于保护具有重要经济意义的地区。研究区域的海洋湖泊对旅游业很重要，研究人员将与政府和非政府保护和教育团体以及潜水和旅游企业密切合作，提高人们对印度尼西亚和帕劳海洋湖泊的价值和威胁的认识。该项目将通过为巴布亚开发一个海洋湖泊网站、旅游小册子和海报，以及一个促进奖学金、专业发展和循证公共教育的学生俱乐部，向公众开放。该项目将为科学基础设施作出贡献，为加州大学伯克利分校获奖的古生物博物馆网站提供标本和相关元数据以及内容的在线访问。最后，该项目将通过让早期职业科学家参与并通过培训本科生和研究生以及博士后研究员来帮助建设科学队伍。

This project will survey the taxonomic, genetic, and functional diversity of the organisms found in marine lakes, and investigate the processes that cause gains and losses in this biodiversity. Marine lakes formed as melting ice sheets raised sea level after the last glacial maximum and flooded hundreds of inland valleys around the world. Inoculated with marine life from the surrounding sea and then isolated to varying degrees for the next 6,000 to 15,000 years, these marine lakes provide multiple, independent examples of how environments and interactions between species can drive extinction and speciation. Researchers will survey the microbes, algae, invertebrates, and fishes present in 40 marine lakes in Palau and Papua, and study how diversity has changed over time by retrieving the remains of organisms preserved in sediments on the lake bottoms. The project will test whether the number of species, the diversity of functional roles played by organisms, and the genetic diversity within species increase and decrease in parallel; whether certain species can greatly curtail diversity by changing the environment; whether the size of a lake determines its biodiversity; and whether the processes that control diversity in marine organisms are similar to those that operate on land.Because biodiversity underlies the ecosystem services on which society depends, society has a great interest in understanding the processes that generate and retain biodiversity in nature. This project will also help conserve areas of economic importance. Marine lakes in the study region are important for tourism, and researchers will work closely with governmental and non-governmental conservation and education groups and with diving and tourism businesses to raise awareness of the value and threats to marine lakes in Indonesia and Palau. The project will reach out to the public by developing a marine lakes website, a tourist booklet and posters for Papua, and a student club that promotes scholarship, professional development, and evidence-based public education. The project will contribute to scientific infrastructure by providing online access to specimens and associated metadata, and content for the prize-winning website of the Museum of Paleontology at the University of California at Berkeley. Finally, the project will help build the workforce for science by involving early career scientists and by training undergraduate and graduate students and a postdoctoral researcher.