The biodemography of life span

描述（由申请人提供）：该计划将利用实验技术、生物系统、人口统计概念、统计方法和理论模型来解决有关人类和非人类模型系统（包括脊椎动物）寿命决定因素的问题（哺乳动物的比较人口统计学;鸟类）和无脊椎动物（果蝇）;线虫;蜜蜂）。形成该计划的五个研究项目围绕以下交叉主题组织：（1）寿命是适应性的，并由自然形成;（2）个人在野外年龄;（3）社会性和寿命相互影响;（4）超自然原则为动物寿命的变化提供了所有包容性的秩序。该计划将为蜜蜂、野生地中海果蝇和C。elegans和几十种脊椎动物的文献中的生活史数据，引入新的统计模型来分析模型物种的人口统计数据，开发一种新的方法来研究野外衰老，更充分地发展生物人口学的数学基础，产生新的模型和理论，涉及代际转移和社会性在寿命进化中的作用，探讨有关随机环境对进化寿命和危险率的影响的问题，并使用比较人口学来确定有关寿命进化的一般原则。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This program will bring experimental techniques, biological systems, demographic concepts, statistical methods, and theoretical models to bear on questions concerning the determinants of life span in both humans and in non-human model systems including both vertebrates (comparative demography of mammals; birds) and invertebrates (fruit flies; nematodes; honey bees). The five research projects that form the program are organized around the following crosscutting themes: (1) Life span is adaptive and shaped by nature; (2) Individuals age in the wild; (3) Sociality and life span are mutually affecting; and (4) Superarching principles provide all embracing order to variation in animal life spans. The program will generate new large-scale demographic databases for the honey bee, wild medflies, and C. elegans and life history data from the literature on several dozen vertebrate species, introduce new statistical models for analysis of demographic data on model species, develop a novel methodology for studying aging in the wild, develop more fully the mathematical foundations of biodemography, generate new models and theories concerned with the role of intergenerational transfer and sociality in the evolution of life span, explore questions concerned with the effects of stochastic environments on the evolution life span and hazard rates, and use comparative demography to identify general principles concerning life span evolution.