Does habitat specialisation increase risk under global environmental change? Understanding responses of bat assemblages to habitat degradation-Malawi

Full project title: Does habitat specialisation increase risk under global environmental change? Combining genomic and ecological approaches to understand responses of bat assemblages to habitat degradation in Malawi. Project Background Over half of global population growth by 2050 is expected to occur in Africa [1]. Anthropogenic expansion

creates significant challenges for wildlife conservation; is a significant factor in current and future predicted species extinctions and is regarded as a major threat to biodiversity [2]. Landscape connectivity affects movement and consequently genetic structure; hence, through studying spatial patterns of genetic variation

we can understand how the habitat fragmentation and modification affect species movement patterns [3]. Insectivorous bats are major contributors to mammalian biodiversity that provide important ecosystems services through the suppression of insect pest populations and transportation of nutrients [4].

Understanding what renders a species "extinction prone" is a fundamental question for conservation biologists. A bat species' tolerance to disturbance is influenced by a variety of ecological and functional traits including diet, morphology, foraging style, and roosting ecology [5]. Currently lack of research on African bat

populations both hinders our understanding of the consequences of environmental change, as well as our ability to inform land-use regimes and development, and advise stakeholders at times of increased population pressure. Malawi has been highlighted by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature

(IUCN) as of key importance to bat conservation in Africa, having high endemism and species diversity. Concurrently, Malawi has amongst the highest rates of environmental pressures from agriculture and deforestation in southern Africa and is therefore a model environment to understand and predict the impacts

of future global environmental change on bats. This project will assess the impacts of landscape level anthropogenic disturbance on bat assemblages, genetic composition, movement and ecology. Results will be used to inform landscape level conservation management. Project Aims and Methods This project combines molecular and neo-ecological approaches to study populations of specialist and

generalist bat species across gradients of anthropogenic disturbance: i) high (urban areas), moderate (peri- urban low-density agricultural areas) and low (protected areas) of Malawi. Objectives: 1. Determine the effect of anthropogenic land-use change on patterns of genetic variation and long-term threat to bat species with different ecological requirements (e.g. forest specialist versus generalists)

2. Use a landscape genomics approach to relate the effect of landscape heterogeneity to patterns of bat movement and genetic connectivity across gradients of anthropogenic disturbance 3. Identify landscape elements that facilitate movement in populations of specialist versus generalist species across landscapes in the anthropogenic matrix

4. Develop a machine learning acoustic framework to classify central African echolocating bats 5. Assess the responses of bat assemblages to anthropogenic disturbance (habitat modification) using automatic acoustic classification approaches 5. Translate findings into conservation recommendations to identify measures to increase landscape

connectivity, assemblage diversity and genetic variability