|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
 |
|
Faculty: Beaupre The goal of Dr. Beaupre's research is to understand various mechanisms that influence the distribution and abundance of terrestrial vertebrate ectotherms (Beaupre, 2002). Specifically, this research focuses on how environmental variation (temperature and food abundance) interacts with time budgets and physiological processes of ectotherms to affect their allocations to growth and reproduction. Thermal effects impinge on the allocation of energy and resources to the competing functions of maintenance, growth, reproduction, and storage which in turn, produce variation in population level processes. The favored approach to these problems is to use comparative bioenergetics to learn about constraints and trade-offs that operate on the physiological performance of individuals. Lately, these interests have expanded to address proximate and ultimate influences on the evolution of sexual size dimorphism (also a bioenergetic problem) and the use of individual-based physiologically structured simulations of growth, reproduction and population dynamics (Beaupre and Zaidan, 2001). A natural extension of Beaupre's research on physiologically structured models of populations is the extension of these models to large spatial scales. In the past GIS technology has been used to model rattlesnake den characteristics, resulting in a map of probability of use for each pixel on a 14,000 acre landscape. Habitat use by Timber Rattlesnakes is governed by structural features, which affect the distribution of food and thermal energy (the primary foci of Beaupre's physiological work). The HARLS-CS system dramatically increases our accuracy and enables fine scale mapping and modeling of habitat use. Specifically, the Laser Profiler allows the detailed mapping of structural characteristics (outcrops and cliffs) that are natural areas of high use, and also affect available prey distributions. The radiometer and multispectral camera are used interactively to improve thermal information on the ground (radiometer), and better identify sites with high similarity to known use sites by comparison to spectral camera images. Together, the new equipment will allow finer resolution in animal habitat modeling in collaboration with CAST, facilitating the scaling of physiologically-based population models to higher levels of ecological organization.
|