Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Effects of Food and Water on Movement and Gut Microbiome Diversity

非人灵长类使用不同的策略来定位支持生存和繁殖的食物和水等资源。这个博士论文研究项目研究了野生Kinda狒狒在复杂环境中根据资源分布的不同而变化的运动策略，以及它们的饮食选择如何影响它们肠道中细菌的分布。这项研究的结果将提供重要的见解，将寻找食物的进化策略与社会性灵长类动物的生理结果联系起来。在开展这项工作的同时，博士生将参与针对服务不足的K-12学生的教育科学项目，并通过科学博客和社交媒体参与公共科学。此外，该项目将为不同的本科生和一名美国研究生提供科学培训机会。这项研究调查了关键营养资源--食物和水--的分布如何影响狒狒在环境中的活动方式。研究表明，摄入不同的饮食资源会影响灵长类肠道微生物群，这种微生物栖息在肠道中，进而影响灵长类动物的生物学和健康。这项研究使用了从生活在自然环境中的单个狒狒中提取的数据，以补充基于环境和气候指标的学术研究，而不是营养选择的直接证据。它还增加了对水的明确关注--水是干燥环境中的一种关键资源，也是肠道细菌的来源--以了解单个狒狒之间多样化的饮食选择与肠道健康的关系。研究人员将跟踪一群习惯性的金达狒狒，收集行为数据(例如，饮食和运动)和生物数据(例如，狒狒粪便和水样)。接下来，他们将使用尖端的运动生态学分析(例如，隐马尔可夫模型)来测试与狒狒运动策略相关的不同假说。然后，他们将量化狒狒微生物群多样性，并分析其与水微生物群多样性和病原体水平(例如，大肠杆菌和贾第虫丰度)的关系。这一奖项反映了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。

Nonhuman primates employ different strategies to locate resources such as food and water that support survival and reproduction. This doctoral dissertation research project examines how wild Kinda baboons’ movement strategies vary according to the distribution of resources in complex environments, and how their dietary choices affect the distribution of bacteria in their guts. Results from the study will provide important insights linking evolutionary strategies to search for foodstuffs to physiological outcomes in a social primate. While conducting the work, the doctoral student will participate in educational science programs for under-served K-12 students and engage in public science through scientific blogs and social media. Additionally, the project will provide scientific training opportunities for diverse undergraduate students and a U.S.-based graduate student. The research investigates how the distribution of key nutritional resources – food and water – affect how baboons move through their environments. Research suggests that consuming different dietary resources impacts primate gut microbiomes, the microorganisms inhabiting the gut, which, in turn affect primate biology and health. This research uses data drawn from individual baboons residing in natural settings to complement scholarship that is based on environmental and climate proxies rather than direct evidence of nutritional choices. It also adds an explicit focus on water - a critical resource in dry environments and a source of gut bacteria - to understand how diverse dietary choices among individual baboons relate to gut health. The investigators will follow a habituated troop of Kinda baboons to collect behavioral (e.g., diet and movement) and biological (e.g., baboon fecal and water sample) data. Next, they will employ cutting-edge movement ecology analyses (e.g., hidden Markov models) to test different hypotheses related to baboon movement strategies. They will then quantify baboon microbiome diversity and analyze its relationship to water microbiome diversity and pathogen levels (e.g., E. coli and Giardia abundance).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.