Explaining color pattern diversity through the dynamic analysis of display

几个世纪以来，人类一直对色彩的多样性着迷，色彩科学领域横跨艺术、哲学、心理学和生物学。不同的人和社会有不同的颜色体验，甚至同一个人对颜色的感知也会随着背景的不同而不同。我们感知这种变化的能力要归功于一个复杂的颜色感知系统，特别是相对于其他哺乳动物。其他动物，如鸟类，对颜色的感知甚至更复杂，是地球上颜色最鲜艳的动物之一。这种多样性的根本原因是什么？动物周围的环境，无论是生活在森林里还是开阔的地方，是如何影响颜色的进化和感知的？我们缺乏理解的一个原因可能是颜色信号经常被呈现给观察者，如竞争对手、配偶或捕食者，使用身体不同部位的运动。高速视频技术和计算机编程的最新发展现在使准确描述这些动作成为可能。因此，这个项目将通过比较密切相关的物种来研究动物展示、栖息地和颜色之间的联系。这项工作的总体目标是了解自然界中颜色的多样性，并最终了解颜色感知方式的多样性。虽然很早就认识到显示运动是动物信号的组成部分，但直到最近几年，技术(例如高速摄像机，至关重要，因为许多物种比人类感知运动要精细得多)和分析技术(例如跟踪运动轨迹的深度学习方法)才变得足够先进，可以用来在比较的背景下研究显示，从而将它们与不同物种的颜色和生态差异联系起来。这个项目的目标是量化东半球叶莺(叶莺属)的显示行为、环境和生态特征、社会背景、颜色和颜色模式，因为以前的工作已经显示出光环境、颜色和种群中的显示之间的定性联系。密切相关的同域物种将在不同的栖息地类型的梯度上进行比较，以询问羽毛颜色(通过分光光度法量化)和威胁显示(通过回放实验和高速视频量化)与栖息地的关联，包括背景颜色和粒度，以及普遍的光环境。通过形态形状比较得出的新的分析方法将被用来在连续的尺度上放置显示运动，从而使它们能够跨物种进行排名。这个奖项反映了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，被认为是值得支持的。

Humans have been fascinated by the diversity of color for centuries, and the field of color science spans across art, philosophy, psychology and biology. Different people and societies have different color experiences, and even the same person perceives color differently depending on the background. Our ability to perceive this variation is thanks to a sophisticated color perception system, especially relative to other mammals. Other animals, such as birds, have even more complex color perception, and are among some of the most brilliantly colored animals on the planet. What are the underlying causes of this diversity? How does an animal’s surroundings, such whether it lives in forests or out in the open shape the evolution and perception of colors? One reason for our lack of understanding may be that color signals are frequently presented to observers, such as rivals, mates or predators, using movements of various body parts. Recent developments in high-speed video technology and computer programing now make it possible to accurately describe these movements. This project will therefore study the association between animal displays, habitat, and color by comparing closely related species. The over-arching goal of this work is to understand the diversity of color in nature, and ultimately, the diversity of how color is perceived.While long recognized that display movements are integral component of animal signals, it is only in the past few years that technology (e.g. high speed video cameras, essential because many species can perceive movements much more finely than humans) and analytical techniques (e.g. deep learning methods to trace trajectories of movements) have become sufficiently advanced that they can be used to study displays in a comparative context, thereby linking them to differences in color and ecology across species. The goal of this project is to quantify display behavior, environmental and ecological features, social context, color, and color patterns across the Old World leaf warblers (genus Phylloscopus), chosen because previous work has shown qualitative associations between light environment, color, and displays in the group. Closely related, sympatric, species will be compared across a gradient of habitat types to ask how plumage color (quantified through spectrophotometry) and threat display (quantified by playback experiments and high-speed video) are associated with habitat, including background color and granularity, and prevailing light environments. New methods of analysis derived from comparisons of morphological shape will be used to place display movements on continuous scales, thereby enabling them to be ranked across species. The essential concept is that displays vary with environment, and thereby influence the evolution of both color and color patterns beyond those predicted from static analyses.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.