SeaChange: The evolutionary response of fish stocks to a changing ocean

持续不断的气候变化导致了全球范围内的生物多样性危机，即使在全球保存完好的地区，也有人口减少或灭绝的报道。此外，人类对自然资源的过度开发使保护成为现代社会最紧迫的挑战之一，特别是对高度脆弱的海洋生物的保护。通过SeaChange，我们将专注于巴西一种具有显著经济和生态相关性的热带沙丁鱼物种，以了解该物种如何应对过去的气候变化，并预测它将如何应对未来的温度变化。利用目前可用于非模式生物的基因组工具，我将开发一种新的、可转移的方法来监测鱼类种群，建立一个将影响科学和政策的研究计划。更具体地说，这项建议主要有三个科学目标：i)调查哈伦古拉种群的数量。Ii)计算当前和过去的有效种群数量，并测试其与温度变异性和栖息地适宜性的相关性。通过测试种群大小的变异性与栖息地的变化，我们将能够澄清物种是否受到过去环境变化的积极或负面影响，并预测未来的影响。iii)确定哪些基因组区域是物种对温度适应的基础。这些区域的识别将有助于预测这种物种对未来变暖的反应，并有助于理解适应温度的基因组基础。所有这些问题都可以用佩雷拉博士实验室(LMU-Munich)现有的种群基因组方法来解决。然而，这些方法需要1)Harengula sp.的全基因组重测序。在温度梯度中收集的样本，2)有合适设施的工作环境和3)具有互补技能的合作者的贡献。沃尔特·本杰明在佩雷拉博士的实验室的职位将允许我成功完成这项提议，提供条件，从学习新技能的可能性，从LMU获得实验室和超级计算机在进化生物学系可用，以及与其他研究人员的联系。这个项目不仅有助于了解气温上升对所研究的沙丁鱼和其他具有类似开发和生物学特性的热带物种的影响，而且对我作为渔业基因组科学家的职业发展也是至关重要的。

Ongoing climate change has led to a biodiversity crisis at a global scale, with populations reductions or extinctions being reported even in well-preserved areas of the globe. In addition, human overexploitation of natural resources has placed conservation as one of the most pressing challenges in modern societies, particularly of the highly vulnerable marine organisms. With SeaChange, we will focus on a tropical sardine species of marked economic and ecological relevance in Brazil to understand how this species has responded to past climate change, and to predict how it will respond to future changes in temperature. Using genomic tools that are now available for non-model organisms, I will develop a novel and transferable approach to monitor fish stocks, establishing a research program that will impact both science and policy. More specifically, this proposal has mainly three scientific objectives: i) Investigate the number of stocks of Harengula sp. occurring along the Brazilian coast and the genetic connectivity between these stocks.ii) Calculate current and past effective population size and test its correlation with temperature variability and habitat suitability. By testing the variability in population size in comparison with changes in habitat, we will be able to clarify if the species was positively or negatively affected by past environmental change and predict future effects.iii) Identify which genomic regions underlie species adaptation to temperature. The identification of these regions will help to predict this species response to future warming and will contribute to the understanding of the genomic bases of temperature adaptation.All of these questions can be addressed with population genomic methods that are in place in Dr. Pereira’s lab (LMU-Munich). Yet, these methods require 1) the whole genome resequencing of Harengula sp. samples collected in a temperature gradient, 2) a working environment with suitable facilities and 3) the contribution of collaborators with complementary skills.The Walter Benjamin Position at Dr. Pereira’s lab will allow me to successfully complete this proposal, by providing the conditions in terms of possibility of learning new skills, access to laboratories and supercomputers available at the Evolutionary Biology Department from LMU and the connection with other researchers. This project will not only contribute to the understanding of the impact of increasing temperature on the studied sardine and to other tropical species with similar exploitation and biological characteristics, but will be also crucial for my career development as a Fishery Genomics scientist.