Descrizione del progetto
Nuovi dispositivi multi-sensore per monitorare gli uccelli migratori
La migrazione degli uccelli è un fenomeno straordinario, che vede gli animali percorrere centinaia di migliaia di chilometri per nutrirsi, partorire e allevare la prole. La tecnologia di tracciamento sviluppata nell’ultimo decennio dimostra che gli uccelli migratori possono volare più a lungo e più velocemente di quanto si ritenesse possibile, ma non è ancora chiaro come portino a termine questi viaggi apparentemente impossibili. Il programma MigPerform, finanziato dal CER, indagherà i limiti e gli adattamenti comportamentali e psicologici evolutisi per superarli, rendendo possibili le prestazioni estreme degli uccelli migratori. La ricerca utilizzerà dispositivi di tracciamento innovativi e strumenti di registrazione dei dati multi-sensore in grado di registrare comportamenti e schemi spazio-temporali, comprese le altitudini, la temperatura e la durata dettagliata dei voli e delle soste nell’intero ciclo migratorio.
Obiettivo
Advances in tracking technology during the last decade have shown that migratory birds have the capacity to fly longer and faster than we previously thought was possible. Yet, we do not know how birds perform these seemingly impossible travels as it previously only was possible to record spatiotemporal patterns.
The overall aim of this project is to reveal constraints and the behavioural and physiological adaptations that has evolved to overcome them, thus making the extreme performances of migratory birds possible. This goal will be met by using novel tracking devices, multisensor data loggers, that in addition to spatiotemporal patterns also record behaviour, including flight altitudes, temperature and detailed timing of flights and stopovers during the entire migration cycle. The few multisensor tracking studies carried out to date have provided hints of stunning new insights, and seriously challenged previously assumed limits on peak flight altitudes, in-flight changes of altitudes, and duration of individual flights. In particular, I have together with colleagues discovered a totally unexpected altitudinal behaviour: some bird species change their flight altitude between night and day, and fly at extremely high altitudes during the day (up to 6000-8000 m). But what makes a migratory bird fly as high as Mount Everest, even when there are no mountains to cross?
By launching an extensive multisensor data logging programme, combined with wind tunnel experiments and field studies, the proposed project will change our understanding of the possibilities and limitations of bird migration. This will be done by disentangling the causes and consequences of bird’s altitudinal behaviour, the flexibility, timing and duration of migratory flights (if birds only use diurnal or nocturnal flights, if they prolong flights to last both day and night or even fly nonstop between wintering and breeding grounds), and the costs and consequences of these seemingly extreme behaviours.
Campo scientifico
Programma(i)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
ERC - Support for frontier research (ERC)Istituzione ospitante
22100 Lund
Svezia