Collaborative Research: MRA: Insectivore Response to Environmental Change

低层大气(即大气层)是数十亿生物的家园，包括微生物、昆虫和鸟类。大气层中的物种经常以其他空气中的生物为食物，相互依存。近几十年来，鸟类和蝴蝶等许多大气层生物的数量一直在迅速减少。这个项目将研究两种鸟类和一种蝙蝠的生态，这三种物种都以昆虫为食，以及它们的种群如何以复杂的方式对环境变化做出反应。当这三个物种从栖息地出来时，也可以通过使用美国天气监测雷达网NEXRAD的最先进的计算机视觉技术来跟踪它们。项目研究人员将使用来自NEXRAD网络的庞大且不断增长的数据库来量化两种鸟类(紫貂和树燕)和墨西哥自由尾巴蝙蝠空中觅食和群体习性生态变化的原因和后果。该项目将利用来自NSF国家生态观测网(NEON)的环境数据以及雷达数据来确定物种丰度、觅食、繁殖和其他季节性模式变化的驱动因素。这些海量的数据集将相互整合，以预测这三个大气层物种在区域到大陆范围内的变化，并对环境变化做出反应。这些研究还将包括一名博士后研究员和几名研究生的培训机会，并将包括为学生和研究人员(包括科学界代表性不足群体的成员)主办雷达空气生态学年度讲习班。该项目有两个目标：(1)了解过去25年来全球环境变化如何影响航空食虫动物的季节时间和种群数量；(2)确定近期飞行食虫动物数量和季节变化的驱动因素。在过去的半个世纪里，空中食虫动物的数量出现了急剧下降--通常比其他空中昆虫类群的下降速度要快得多。了解推动这些变化的机制将对数百种鸟类、蝙蝠和昆虫产生广泛影响，并可作为陆地和水生生态系统健康的指标。然而，理解这些机制所需的数据集目前缺乏，而且迫切需要。虽然动物的宏观遥感平台很少，但NEXRAD已经成为关于飞行动物的全面信息来源，具有大规模和长期(20年)的覆盖范围。研究人员将采用一种跨学科的方法，整合雷达遥感、霓虹灯数据和计算机建模，以填补这一重要空白，并测试有关种群变化、物候和营养相互作用的问题，以应对大规模环境变化的人为驱动因素。PI将把他们的项目重点放在三种空中昆虫物种广泛的栖息行为上，它们是环境变化和生态系统健康的领头羊：紫色蝙蝠、树燕和墨西哥自由尾巴蝙蝠。这种协作和跨学科的方法将产生对不断变化的环境的大规模、定量和预测性的洞察。它们还将为使用霓虹灯数据研究全球变化产生新的工作流程、方法和见解。通过这项提议，调查人员将生成工具和网络界面，以自动识别、定位和传播有关全美范围内栖息现象的信息。航空食虫动物的状况代表了生态系统健康的季节性脉动--提出的问题、基础设施发展和外延将用于监测大陆规模的航空食虫动物的状况。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The lower atmosphere (i.e., aerosphere) is home to literally billions of organisms, including microbes, insects and birds. Species in the aerosphere often use other airborne organisms for food and are interdependent on one another. In recent decades, populations of many aerosphere organisms, such as birds and butterflies, have been rapidly declining in abundance. This project will examine the ecology of two bird and one bat species, all three of which feed on insects, and how their populations are responding in complicated ways to environmental change. These three species can also all be tracked when they emerge from their roosts by using state-of-the-art computer vision techniques with NEXRAD, the United States weather surveillance radar network. Project researchers will use the vast and ever-growing repository of data from the NEXRAD network to quantify the causes and consequences of ecological change in the aerial feeding and group habits of the two bird species (Purple Martins and Tree Swallows) and Mexican free-tailed Bats. The project will leverage environmental data from the NSF National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) together with the radar data to identify the drivers of changes in abundance, feeding, reproduction and other seasonal patterns. The massive data sets will be integrated with one another to develop predictions of how these three aerosphere species are changing at regional to continental scale, and in response to environmental changes. These studies will also incorporate training opportunities for a postdoctoral researcher and several graduate students and will include hosting an annual workshop on radar aeroecology for students and researchers (including members of underrepresented groups in science). Project investigators will work with a media team to produce a series of five video presentations on studying the ecology of birds, bats and insects in the aerosphere.This project has two objectives: (1) understand how global environmental change has impacted seasonal timing and population abundance of aerial insectivores over the past twenty-five years and (2) determine drivers of recent within and between seasonal variation in timing and abundance. Aerial insectivore populations have shown precipitous declines in the last half century — often at much steeper rates than other aerial taxa. Understanding mechanisms driving these changes would have broad implications for hundreds of species of birds, bats, and insects, and also serve as an indicator of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystem health. However, the data sets needed to understand these mechanisms are currently lacking and urgently needed. While macroscale remote-sensing platforms for animals are rare, NEXRAD has emerged as a comprehensive source of information about flying animals, with large-scale and long-term (two decades) coverage. The investigators will employ an interdisciplinary approach integrating radar remote sensing, data from NEON, and computer modelling to fill this vital gap and to test questions about population change, phenology, and trophic interactions in response to anthropogenic drivers of macroscale environmental change. The PIs will focus their project on the widespread roosting behaviors of three aerial insectivore species as bellwethers for environmental change and ecosystem health: Purple Martin, Tree Swallow, and Mexican free-tailed Bat. This collaborative and interdisciplinary approach will yield large-scale, quantitative, and predictive insights into changing environments. They will also generate new workflows, methodologies, and insights for the use of NEON data for the study of global change. Through this proposal the investigators will generate the tools and web interface to automatically identify, locate, and disseminate information regarding U.S.-wide roosting phenomena. The status of aerial insectivores is a representation of the seasonal pulse of ecosystem health — the questions, infrastructural development, and outreach proposed will serve as for monitoring the status of aerial insectivores at the continental scale.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.