Collaborative research: RUI: multilevel effects of urbanization on wildlife health: an integrative approach

The National Science Foundation, under its Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074), awarded Carroll College a $179,949 Project Grant to study the multilevel effects of urbanization on the health of the western deer mouse. This 3-year research project aims to identify the key factors that impact wildlife health in urban areas, as the deer mouse inhabits both urban and rural environments. Researchers will collect data on habitat characteristics and mouse health metrics, such as immune function and stress, along an urbanization gradient near Spokane, Washington. The findings will inform conservation and habitat restoration efforts in the face of increasing urbanization. The project also provides interdisciplinary research training to undergraduate students across three institutions and develops hands-on research activities to integrate into university courses.

Abstract

Urban areas are growing worldwide, causing significant loss of habitat for wildlife. Exactly how such changes in habitat lead to declines in wildlife populations is not fully understood. The associated mechanisms are hard to study because the species most negatively impacted simply DON?t occur in urban habitats. This project focuses on a species, the western deer mouse, that is found in both urban and rural habitats. Researchers will collect data on habitat, such as food availability and noise, and on mouse health, such as immune function and stress, along a gradient from urban woodlots to nearly pristine forests in and around spokane, washington. Data will be used to identify which factors most impact wildlife health in urban areas. Because wildlife can carry diseases that are passed to humans, information about the health of urban species has direct relevance to human health. Many undergraduate students from three institutions will be involved in the study, thereby gaining important interdisciplinary training. Additionally, two in-class research activities based on this project will be developed and implemented in courses at the three institutions, giving hundreds of additional students experience in research. Peromyscus sonoriensis was selected as a model organism because IT inhabits a wide diversity of environments across an urbanization gradient, thus facilitating natural comparative analyses of direct and indirect impacts of urbanization. Most other studies focus on only one or a few variables of urbanization and the models that result are simplistic, as many variables are involved and frequently CO-vary. This study uses a suite of urbanization variables that are predicted to affect, and be indicators of, an animal?s health. Correspondingly, ?health? Will be assessed with a variety of metrics of stress (acute and chronic), body condition (e.g., parasite infection, reproductive status), immune function (e.g., quantification of neutrophils, b cells, helper t cells), and GUT microbiome analysis. Using research sites located along an urbanization gradient, researchers will: 1) quantify urbanization and its effects on habitat characteristics, 2) assess multiple metrics of deer mouse health, and 3) integrate responses between and within habitats and organisms to investigate multi-dimensional effects of urbanization on deer mouse health. The mechanism-based findings can be used in efforts to conserve or remediate habitats in the face of encroaching urbanization, enabling a proactive rather than reactive approach to conservation and restoration. 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.