Sensory Traps, Imprinting, and Cross-contextual Learning: Can Shifting Food Preferences Alter Patterns of Mate Choice?

了解生物多样性如何演变，特别是突然的环境变化如何导致植物和动物的快速反应变化，是生物学的一个重要挑战。这项研究检验了一个简单但新颖的假设，以解释为什么这么多动物在求爱期间会进化出精致而看似随意的特征和颜色。该项目使用来自生物学和心理学多个领域的想法来测试在一种情况下学习的偏好（例如动物对特定颜色食物的偏好）可以影响另一种情况下偏好的形成（例如在选择配偶时对相同颜色的偏好）。这些想法将在两种跳蛛中进行测试：一种是肯尼亚的跳蛛，它吃雌性蚊子（特别是人类疟疾的媒介），喜欢红色食物;另一种是美国的跳蛛，它吃许多农业害虫，避免红色食物。 这项工作将改变女性对食物颜色的偏好，然后确定这如何影响女性在配偶中寻找的颜色。这两个物种在各自的食物网中发挥着关键作用;了解它们的种群如何对猎物的变化做出反应对人类健康和农业具有重要意义。这项研究将吸引几名本科生研究人员，他们将通过实践经验学习科学过程。此外，它还将资助几名非科学专业的学生参加当地社区学院的学习，以提高其他领域未来领导者的科学素养（例如，政治、商业、教育）。除了传统的科学出版物，该团队还将在一个名为Arachnophilia的合作艺术展览中传播研究结果（将在美国和肯尼亚举行）。尽管近150年的研究旨在了解推动复杂雄性观赏性状进化的机制，但生物学家经常偶然发现自然界中令人困惑的模式，挑战现有理论（例如，配偶偏好的年度波动，地理分布和偏好的意想不到的模式，以及看似随意的装饰品的存在）。显然，目前的理论福尔斯未能充分解释自然界的复杂性。这项研究整合了动物行为中三种不同范式的思想（感官陷阱，性印记和跨情境学习）。它提出了一种新的机制，为男性显示特征的快速演变：一个人食人的女性最近的经验与丰富多彩的食物将塑造她如何解释男性的丰富多彩的求爱显示。尽管简单，这个想法可以解释多样化的广泛模式，并适用于广泛的分类群。使用相关的实地研究和操纵实验室实验，这一想法将在两种跳蛛物种中进行测试：Evarcha culicivora（肯尼亚的按蚊专家）和Habronattus pyrithrix（来自美国西南部的通才捕食者）。这项研究涉及扭转这两个物种的猎物颜色偏好，通过将它们暴露于不同类型的天然彩色食物，并评估随后对配偶偏好的影响。这项研究利用雄性跳蛛的魅力求爱展示创造性地将研究，科学教育和推广联系起来。工作将由本科研究人员（包括社区学院的非科学专业）团队进行，并将通过合作艺术展览进行传播。

Understanding how biodiversity evolves, and in particular, how sudden environmental changes can lead to rapid responsive changes in plants and animals is an important challenge in biology. This study examines a simple, yet novel, hypothesis to explain why so many animals have evolved elaborate and seemingly arbitrary traits and colors that they display to prospective mates during courtship. This project uses ideas from multiple fields of biology and psychology to test the idea that preferences learned in one context (such as a preference that an animal learns for a specific color of food) can affect the formation of preferences in another context (such as a preference for that same color when choosing a mate). These ideas will be tested in two species of jumping spiders: a Kenyan species that eats female mosquitoes (specifically, the vector of human malaria) where red colored food is preferred and an American species that feeds on many agricultural pests and where red colored food is avoided. Work will alter female food color preference and then determine how this impacts the colors that females look for in mates. Both of these species play critical roles in their respective food webs; understanding how their populations respond to changes in prey have important implications for human health and agriculture. The study will engage several undergraduate student researchers, who will learn the scientific process through hands-on experience. In addition, it will fund the participation of several non-science majors at a local community college to improve scientific literacy among future leaders in other fields (e.g., politics, business, education). In addition to traditional scientific publication, the team will also disseminate findings in a collaborative art exhibit entitled Arachnophilia (to take place in both the US and Kenya).Despite nearly 150 years of research to understand the mechanisms that drive the evolution of elaborate male ornamental traits biologists frequently stumble upon puzzling patterns in nature that challenge existing theory (e.g., yearly fluctuations in mate preferences, unexpected patterns of geographic variation in ornamentation and preference, and the presence of seemingly arbitrary ornaments). Clearly, the current theory falls short of fully explaining the complexity in nature. This study integrates ideas from across three distinct paradigms in animal behavior (sensory traps, sexual imprinting, and cross-contextual learning). It proposes a novel mechanism for the rapid evolution of male display traits: that an individual cannibalistic female's recent experiences with colorful food will shape how she interprets a male's colorful courtship display. Despite its simplicity, this idea could explain broad patterns of diversification and be applicable to a wide range of taxa. Using correlational field studies and manipulative lab experiments, this idea will be tested in two jumping spider species: Evarcha culicivora (a specialist on Anopheles mosquitoes in Kenya) and Habronattus pyrrithrix (a generalist predator from the southwestern USA). This study involves reversing the prey color preferences of these two species by exposing them to different types of naturally-occurring colorful foods and evaluating subsequent effects on mate preferences. This study capitalizes on the charismatic courtship displays of male jumping spiders to creatively link research, science education, and outreach. Work will be carried out by teams of undergraduate researchers (including non-science majors at a community college) and will be disseminated through a collaborative art exhibit.