To: The Ecology
Community
From: Clara B. Jones
(Director, Mammals and Phenogroups, MaPs, Asheville, NC)
Re: Towards Assembling
a Global Data Archive of Morbidity and Mortality Events for Terrestrial Mammals
Date: 1/27/13
The purpose of this letter is to highlight a need for, and
rationales for, assembling an “international repository” of Morbidity and Mortality
(M and M) data for animals in the wild.
Terrestrial mammals are emphasized (Ameca y Juárez et al., 2012) because
of their overwhelming dominance among terrestrial vertebrates and because, Homo sapiens, the species responsible
for inducing and escalating recent deleterious effects on global
biogeochemistry, is a member of Class, Mammalia. A “multi-metric index” of M and M data
requires a bioinformatic, quantitative approach yielding systematic storage, classification,
and integration of information, permitting “knowledge management”, directed
search, as well as analysis. Nested
bioinformatics designs are sensitive to scale, permitting weighted input of
data from individual to ecosystem levels.
Knowledge of mortality patterns, assessed relative to other storable
data (e.g., age-sex structure of populations, co-varying spatiotemporal,
including, environmental, factors) would provide researchers and their
collaborators a powerful source of information for evaluating ramifications of
anthropogenic stressors for mammalian populations.
The proposed archive would serve as a “global information
grid” of mortality events associated with local, regional, and global
environmental regimes. In addition to
serving as a repository of data, the archive’s capacities for multi-dimensional
mapping of variations in age, size, development, physiology, and genetics would
permit a more comprehensive understanding of life-history* evolution and
shifting mean fitness of populations in community and ecosystem contexts, with
the potential to generate novel qualitative and quantitative perspectives on
questions of critical import to conservation biology, ecology, and evolutionary
biology. Among other concerns to
conservation biologists and their colleagues, a “global information grid” of M
and M data for terrestrial mammals would address Woodroffe’s (1999) call for
systematic approaches to dissection, diagnosis, and treatment of diseases in
wild mammal populations.
Zipkin et al. (2010) published a population modeling
technique bounded by logic interpretable by any researcher familiar with the
conceptual framework and methods of statistical probability. These authors provided a “primer” on the use
of “Markov chains” for studies of disease dynamics in natural populations of
animals. Utilizing “typical” survey records
of morbidity and mortality events, Markov chains estimate probabilities “of state
[event, condition] transitions between consecutive time steps [spatial or
temporal intervals]”. This approach to
quantitative ecology is a type of “epidemiological modeling” amenable to
multilevel (hierarchical) modeling (Qian & Shen, 2007), whereby, for
instance, M & M at the individual or population level could be
quantitatively assessed with associated metrics at the same (limiting resource
dispersions), lower (soil gradients, leaf litter dispersion) or higher (interspecific
assemblages, variations in nutrient cycling) levels of abiotic and biotic
organization..
A facultative search of “disease, mammals” in seven
widely-read American and British journals publishing a significant number of
papers on basic ecology and conservation biology was conducted. Several patterns were apparent. First, though length of time since
publication of first issues varied across journals and while “search”
applications are probably structured differently, numbers of papers on topics
related to mammalian disease indicated relative emphasis, as follows: Conservation Biology, 494 papers; Ecology, 418; Functional Ecology, 102; International
Journal of Primatology, 230; Journal
of Applied Ecology, 175; Journal of
Ecology, 1; Journal of Mammalogy,
355; and, Oikos, 207. Most articles addressing mammalian diseases
focused on one type of disease (e.g., rabies, Lyme’s disease), on one category
of pathology in a single or among related species (e.g., intestinal parasites)
or, on parasite-host associations. Most
of the studies investigated disease effects at the population-level rather than
epidemiological patterns across time and space from the individual to higher
levels. Specialized wildlife biology and veterinary medicine
journals, as well as, comprehensive texts and field manuals covering “ecology
of pests and pathogens” or “field procedures for the study of diseases” address
M and M of animals in Nature, as well.
My impression is that, among vertebrates, birds and bats have been
studied more thoroughly than terrestrial mammals.
Table 1 summarizes opportunistic observations of pathologies
observed for 156 immobilized adult male and female mantled howler monkeys in
Costa Rica. Males were more likely to
exhibit pathologies (25/36= 69%) compared to females (50/120= 42%), possible
byproducts of risks from male-male competition and time- rather than
energy-maximization (see, for example, Jones, 2005). Considering the population as a whole, 51% (80/156) of individuals in the sample exhibited obvious abnormalities. Table 1 highlights the broad array of pathologies
affecting individual mammals, suggesting that many field studies of M and M may
be limited by their focus on one causative factor. Several seemingly minor anomalies may,
cumulatively, induce sub-lethal or lethal stress at one or more interacting, systemic levels, from
biochemical (genetic, protein, e.g., de
novo mutation) to physiological and developmental (e.g., sustained
production of cortisol, increased infant mortality) to exposed phenotype (e.g., melanoma, bots), including,
behavior (e.g., compromised defensive capacities, change [++, --] in baseline [presumably, optimal] interaction rates).
The “collective intelligence” available to researchers and their collaborators from the proposed archive would facilitate multilevel epidemiological studies sensitive to variations in anthropogenic effects, including, capacities for local, regional, or global forecasting. The proposed M and M archive would facilitate capabilities to deposit, assemble, process, share, manage, and diagnose its “multi-metric indices” for hypothesis-testing and effective conservation management in basic and applied ecology.
*Drew Purves [Microsoft, UK] and his colleagues are working on a global model of body size x longevity [D. Purves, personal communication], part of a global ecosystem modeling project. The M and M archive proposed in the present blogpost would permit global modeling of [terrestrial mammal] female body size [FBS] x mortality or FBS x survivorship, based on the largest possible sample of life history data available. Interpreting the logic of Purves' program and applying the presumed logic to the M and M archive advanced herein, the "international repository" of M and M data could be modeled for a comprehensive, general, statement of Life History phenomena, including, partitioning of its variability, using the simplifying proxy that variations in female body size [FBS] x mortality and/or FBS x survivorship relationships are governed by the same rules [1] within- and between-taxa, and [2] within- and across-levels of bioenergetic and biogeochemical organization [scales and gradients]. Ideally, one would substitute a sufficiently-large sample of female age distributions [FAD] x mortality x environment [climate] and/or FAD x survivorship x environment [climate] for a synthesis of Life History trajectories sensitive to local and regional conditions.
The “collective intelligence” available to researchers and their collaborators from the proposed archive would facilitate multilevel epidemiological studies sensitive to variations in anthropogenic effects, including, capacities for local, regional, or global forecasting. The proposed M and M archive would facilitate capabilities to deposit, assemble, process, share, manage, and diagnose its “multi-metric indices” for hypothesis-testing and effective conservation management in basic and applied ecology.
*Drew Purves [Microsoft, UK] and his colleagues are working on a global model of body size x longevity [D. Purves, personal communication], part of a global ecosystem modeling project. The M and M archive proposed in the present blogpost would permit global modeling of [terrestrial mammal] female body size [FBS] x mortality or FBS x survivorship, based on the largest possible sample of life history data available. Interpreting the logic of Purves' program and applying the presumed logic to the M and M archive advanced herein, the "international repository" of M and M data could be modeled for a comprehensive, general, statement of Life History phenomena, including, partitioning of its variability, using the simplifying proxy that variations in female body size [FBS] x mortality and/or FBS x survivorship relationships are governed by the same rules [1] within- and between-taxa, and [2] within- and across-levels of bioenergetic and biogeochemical organization [scales and gradients]. Ideally, one would substitute a sufficiently-large sample of female age distributions [FAD] x mortality x environment [climate] and/or FAD x survivorship x environment [climate] for a synthesis of Life History trajectories sensitive to local and regional conditions.
Ameca y Juárez, E.I., Mace, G.M., Cowlishaw, G., and
Pettorelli, N. 2012. Natural population die-offs: causes and consequences for
terrestrial mammals. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 27: 272-277.
Jones, C.B. 2005. Behavioral Flexibility in Primates: Causes
and Consequences. Springer, New York.
Qian, S.S., and Shen, Z. 2007. Ecological applications of
multilevel ANOVA. Ecology 88: 2489-2495.
Woodroffe, R. 1999. Managing disease threats to wild animals.
Animal Conservation 2: 185-193.
Zipkin, E.F., Jennelle, C.S., and Cooch, E.G. 2010. A primer
on the application of Markov Chains to the study of wildlife disease dynamics.
Methods in Ecology and Evolution 1: 192-198.
Table 1. Pathologies recorded opportunistically during
immobilization of individually-marked and aged mantled howler monkeys (Alouatta palliata palliata) at Hacienda
La Pacífica, Cañas, Costa Rica, tropical dry forest habitats (riparian and
deciduous). Data were collected in 1976
by Norman J. Scott, Jr. (USFW, ret.) and his assistants, including the present
author. (N= 156: n= 120 females, n= 36 males)
PATHOLOGY
|
TYPE-CHARACTER
|
#FEMALES
|
#MALES
|
SUB-TOTAL
|
TOTAL
|
APPARENT GENETIC ABMORMALITIES
|
Hirsuteness
|
5
|
5
|
||
PARASITES
|
Botfly Larvae
|
2
|
1
|
3
|
3
|
Roundworms
|
11
|
5
|
16
|
16
|
|
Tick
|
1
|
1
|
|||
INFECTIONS
|
Herpes-like
|
2
|
0
|
2
|
|
Lymphodenopathy
|
2
|
1
|
3
|
||
Undiagnosed
|
2
|
1
|
3
|
||
SCABS
|
Fungus?, Eczema?,
Herpes?
|
9
|
0
|
9
|
9
|
TESTICULAR
ABNORMALITIES
|
?
|
2
|
2
|
||
APPARENT NUTRIENT
DEFICIENCY
|
?
|
9
|
1
|
10
|
10
|
SCARS
|
?
|
5
|
8
|
13
|
13
|
BROKEN BONES
|
?
|
7
|
6
|
13
|
13
|
TOTAL
|
50
|
25
|
80
|
80
|
|