Linking Foraging Behaviors to Demography to understand Albatrosses Population Responses to Climate Change

了解气候变化的生态后果--现在和未来--是保护生物学的一个中心问题。该项目的目标是确定气候变化对黑眉信天翁的影响，黑眉信天翁是南大洋繁殖的海鸟。黑眉信天翁表现出非凡的飞行适应能力，它利用风作为能源来进行长距离滑翔。这是它们觅食策略的基础，它们通过这些策略为自己和后代获取食物。然而，气候变化预计将改变南大洋的风型。这个项目将分析风对生活史特征(觅食行为、身体状况和人口统计特征)的影响，以及这些特征对种群的影响。新的人口模型将提供觅食行为和自然环境之间的联系，并评估这种种群在面对气候变化时的持久性。理解和预测种群对气候变化的反应是重要的，因为世界-S气候将在整个21世纪及以后继续变化。为了帮助指导面对气候变化的保护战略和政策决策，迫切需要对人口灭绝风险进行可靠的评估。由于最近黑眉信天翁的种群数量急剧减少，国际自然保护联盟认为它是濒危物种。该项目将提高我们对气候影响黑眉信天翁生活史和种群的机制的理解，以改进对未来气候变化下灭绝风险的预测。

Understanding the ecological consequences - present and future-of climate change is a central question in conservation biology. The goal of this project is to identify the effects of climate change on the Black-Browed Albatross, a seabird breeding in the Southern Ocean. The Black-Browed Albatross exhibits remarkable flight adaptations, using winds as an energy source to glide for long distances. This is the basis of their foraging strategy, by which they obtain food for themselves and their offspring. Climate change, however, is expected to modify wind patterns over the Southern Ocean. This project will analyze the effect of winds on life history traits (foraging behaviors, body conditions and demographic traits), and the effects of these traits on populations. New demographic models will provide the link between foraging behavior and the physical environment, and evaluate the persistence of this population in the face of climate change.Understanding and predicting population responses to climate change is important because the world?s climate will continue to change throughout the 21st century and beyond. To help guide conservation strategies and policy decisions in the face of climate change, reliable assessments of population extinction risks are urgently needed. The Black-Browed Albatross is considered endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature due to recent drastic reductions in its population size. This project will improve our understanding of the mechanisms by which climate affects the life history and populations of Black-Browed Albatross to improve prediction of extinction risks under future climate change.