Ecology, evolution, and adaptation in small populations

环境变化是对物种和生态系统的主要威胁，但这种变化可以通过多种途径和进化时间尺度发挥作用。因此，社会需要对个人、群体、社区和生态系统进行详细、长期的研究，以可靠地描述和解释对人类生活和福祉至关重要的过程。具体而言，平均或极端气候条件的变化可能会极大地影响对地球上生命至关重要的人口的生产力和持久性。人类影响栖息地类型、质量和丰度的方式的变化，通过改善某些物种的条件，但往往减少维持稀有、濒危和/或文化上重要的物种所需的条件，进一步影响人类和非人类种群。 因此，在管理和未管理的鸟类，哺乳动物和植物种群中识别和解开这种影响一直是我32年来工作的重点。由于这些因素可以驱动进化的变化，以及物种的持久性，我的工作包括应用进化理论的物种和生态系统的保护和管理。 该提案概述了对现有理论的测试，使用了两项对20-47年期间监测的植物和动物种群的比较和横截面研究，包括：1）对自由生活鸟类的遗传学，人口统计学和个体生活史进行的最详细的研究（歌麻雀，Melospiza melodia）和2）海葱的种群遗传学和人口统计学（Plectritis congesta），一年生植物研究= 300人口在其范围内的BC，WA和OR。我在每项研究中的目标都是互补的，包括：1）确定人口统计学变化的非生物和生物驱动因素之间的联系，2）利用这种理解来预测未来持续的环境变化如何影响生命史进化，人口增长和物种范围限制。实现这些目标将从根本上有助于我们在未来管理环境效益和服务的成功，并ALOS提供了非常严格的测试的关键预测人口和进化理论应用于野生种群。因为很少有共识和有限的数据来解决这些问题，我的长期研究的变化表型，基因型，生活史，自然选择，人口增长和持久性提供了有前途的机会，研究生和博士后研究员感兴趣的接口的基础和应用生态学和进化。我的研究结果对于以适度的成本回答有关自由生活物种的生态学和进化动力学的复杂问题特别有价值，并有可能极大地改善稀有物种的管理，否则不可能详细研究。

Environmental change is a key threat to species and ecosystems, but such changes can act via multiple paths and over evolutionary timescales. As a consequence, society  requires detailed, longterm studies of individuals, populations, communities, and ecosystems to reliably characterize and explain process critical to human life and well-being. Specifically, change in average or extreme climatic conditions can dramatically affect the productivity and persistence of populations essential to life on earth. Change in the ways humans influence habitat type, quality and abundance further affect human and non-human populations alike by enhancing conditions for some species, but often reducing conditions necessary to maintain rare, endagered, and/or culturally important species.  As a consequence, identifying and disentangling such effects in managed and unmanaged bird, mammal, and plant populations has been the focus of my work for 32yrs. Because such factors can drive evolutionary change, as well as the persistence of species, my work included the application of evolutionary theory to the conservation and management of species and ecosystems.  This proposal outline tests of existing theory using two comparative and cross-sectional studies of plant and animal populations monitored for periods of 20-47 yrs, including: 1) the most detailed study of the genetics, demography and individual life history of a free-living bird ever undertaken (song sparrows, Melospiza melodia) and 2) the population genetics and demography of Seablush (Plectritis congesta), an annual plant studied in = 300 populations across its range in BC, WA and OR. My goals in each study are complimentary and include: 1) identifying links between abiotic and biotic drivers of change in population demography, and 2) using this understanding to predict how continued environmental change in future may influence life history evolution, population growth and species range limits. Achieving these goals will contribute fundamentally to our success in managing environmental benefits and services in future, and alos offer extremely rigorous tests of critical predictions in demographic and evolutionary theory applied to wild populations. Because there is little consensus and limited data to resolve such issues, my longterm studies of variation in phenotype, genotype, life history, natural selection, and population growth and persistence offer promising opportunities to graduate students and post-doctoral fellows interested in the interface of fundamental and applied ecology and evolution. My results will be particularly valuable to answering complex questions about the ecology and evolutionary dynamics of free-living species at modest cost and have the potential to dramatically improve the management of rare species that are otherwise impossible to study in detail.