NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2022: Predicting Host-Parasite Eco-Evolutionary Dynamics Across a Climate Gradient

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2022, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment and Phenotypes. The fellowship supports research and training of the fellow that will contribute to the area of Rules of Life in innovative ways. This research will address how climate change will affect interactions between parasites and their hosts.

A warming environment may favor the host or the parasite, and each partner may differ in their ability to adapt. The fellow will conduct a set of studies and experiments using larvae of the tree hole mosquito Aedes sierrensis and its parasite Lambornella clarki to determine how temperature affects the interaction between hosts and parasites, and how the adaptation of each species to its local environment shapes this interaction.

Additionally, the fellow will mentor undergraduates from underrepresented groups in biology during summers and will lead workshops to introduce students to computer programming.

The fellow will combine genomic sequencing of populations of hosts and parasites collected from a range-wide climate gradient with a local adaptation experiment to directly test the theory that the species with higher genetic diversity and migration rates will be ahead in the coevolutionary arms race and show signs of local adaptation. Further, the fellow will construct a modified Susceptible-Infected-Recovered model, parameterized with experimental data on local adaptation and thermal performance and validated with observational data from the range-wide survey.

The model will provide a theoretical framework for integrating thermal and coevolutionary responses into predictions of disease prevalence under climate change, which has relevance to other types of diseases, e.g. mosquito-vectored diseases and diseases caused by facultative parasites. The research findings will be shared with vector control agencies and with the public through outreach events at the Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve.

Overall, results from this work will lead to a more general understanding of the ecological and evolutionary principles that guide the response of host–parasite systems to climate change. The fellow will receive training in genomic analysis, experimental design, and model construction and parameterization.

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.