CAREER: Digitized data, dung beetles and the dome: improving the understanding of species distribution through research and planetarium-based education.

职业：数字化数据、粪甲虫和穹顶：通过研究和天文馆教育提高对物种分布的了解。

基本信息

批准号：
1942193
负责人：
Nicole Gunter
金额：
$ 97.44万
依托单位：
Cleveland Museum of Natural History
依托单位国家：
美国
项目类别：
Continuing Grant
财政年份：
2020
资助国家：
美国
起止时间：
2020-02-01 至 2024-02-29
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1942193&HistoricalAwards=false
关键词：
CAREER Digitized data dung beetles

项目摘要

Understanding species distribution is central to the biodiversity modeling that is increasingly used to inform conservation planning and other applied sciences that benefit society. This project integrates a research program with a new informal education program to enhance both the scientific and public understanding of evolutionary and planetary processes that contribute to species distribution. The research component of this project will assess the importance of evolutionary history in niche modeling that estimates species distribution, with the aim of improving the approach used to select variable environmental layers used in these models. The ability to more accurately predict species distribution under both present and future climate scenarios is essential for identifying and understanding the habitats of species at risk of extinction, modeling the spread of introduced species or medically important invertebrates that can transmit disease, and much more. The findings from the research will be incorporated into the new informal education program that teaches biogeography under a planetarium dome. This program also will leverage the global efforts that have amassed over 1.3 billion specimen records worldwide, as well as technological advances in planetarium software, to visualize biodiversity data in an immersive and dynamic setting. This novel outlet to broadcast digitized data will transform how institutions equipped with planetariums communicate biodiversity data and will create endless opportunities to develop new programs for sharing biodiversity research with the public. Improved public understanding of these complex scientific concepts can facilitate changes in attitudes to the impact of environmental change through increased awareness of the connectivity between planetary processes and life on Earth.A combined systematic and phylogeographic study of Australian dung beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae) will be used to assess the importance of evolutionary history in environmental niche modeling. This model-group contains both a relictual Gondwanan and a younger Indomalayan clade that will be assessed in a phylogenetic and ecological framework to explore the heritability of environmental tolerance in closely-related but biogeographically distinct taxa. The evolution of niche dynamics for these biogeographically distinct faunas will be assessed through comparative analysis of niche models, predicted niche occupancy profiles and disparity through time plots. Findings will inform environmental layers selection for future analyses and improve the understanding of biotic and abiotic factors that contribute to species distribution. Beyond informing a key question in evolutionary biology, these results will be integrated into the new planetarium program that aims to improve public scientific literacy relating to species' evolution, ecology and planetary change. Program content will align with Ohio's grade 8 learning standard for STEM and will be presented to museum guests in the onsite planetarium, while offsite school programming will be hosted in a mobile planetarium. Program evaluation will assess the impact of teaching evolution using planetariums, the contribution of museums to informal education, and best-practices for leveraging curatorial expertise in public and school programs.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.

了解物种分布是生物多样性建模的核心，该建模越来越多地用于为保护计划和其他受益于社会的应用科学提供信息。该项目将研究计划与新的非正式教育计划相结合，以增强对有助于物种分布的进化和行星过程的科学和公众理解。该项目的研究组成部分将评估估计物种分布的利基模型中进化史的重要性，以改善用于选择这些模型中使用的可变环境层的方法。在当前和未来的气候场景下更准确地预测物种分布的能力对于识别和理解灭绝风险的物种的栖息地至关重要，建模引入的物种或医学上重要的无脊椎动物的传播，可以传播疾病等等。研究结果将纳入新的非正式教育计划中，该计划在天文馆圆顶下教生物地理学。该计划还将利用全球超过13亿标本记录的全球努力以及天文馆软件的技术进步，以在沉浸式和动态的环境中可视化生物多样性数据。这个小说的广播数字化数据将改变配备天文馆的机构如何传达生物多样性数据，并将创造无尽的机会来开发新计划，以与公众共享生物多样性研究。通过提高对地球行星过程和生命之间的连通性的认识，对这些复杂的科学概念的公众理解可以促进对环境变化影响的态度的变化。澳大利亚甲壳虫（Coleoptera：Scarabaeidae：Scarabaeidae：Scarabaeinae：Scarabaeinae）的合并系统和植物地理学研究将用于评估进化史在环境利基建模中的重要性。该模型组既包含遗物的冈瓦南，又包含一个年轻的Indomalayan进化枝，将在系统发育和生态框架中进行评估，以探索与密切相关但生物地理上与众不同但与生物学不同的分类群体中环境宽容的遗传力。这些生物地理上不同动物的利基动力学的演变将通过对利基模型的比较分析，通过时图进行比较分析，预测利基占用概况和差异。调查结果将为环境层的选择提供信息，以进行未来的分析，并提高对有助于物种分布的生物和非生物因素的理解。除了告知进化生物学的关键问题外，这些结果还将集成到新的天文馆计划中，该计划旨在提高与物种的进化，生态学和行星变化有关的公共科学素养。计划内容将与俄亥俄州的STEM的8年级学习标准保持一致，并将介绍给现场天文馆的博物馆客人，而异地学校编程将在移动的天文馆中托管。计划评估将评估使用天文馆的教学进化的影响，博物馆对非正式教育的贡献以及在公共和学校计划中利用策展专业知识的最佳实践。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是通过使用评估的支持，基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准。