High-Throughput Movement Ecology

Ran Nathan
Dept. of Ecology, Evolution & Behavior, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel ran.nathan@mail.huji.ac.il

(seminar in English)

In 2006, Prof. Ran Nathan initiated and led an international research group that proposed a new research paradigm, called Movement Ecology, aimed at integrating studies of whole-organism movements across taxonomic groups (Nathan et al. 2008 PNAS). Since this time, the emerging movement ecology paradigm has greatly benefited from recent developments in wildlife tracking technologies, enhanced computation abilities and powerful data analysis tools, all of which have helped elucidate movement patterns, the underlying movement processes and their consequences. Yet, some key questions in ecology and behavior remain unresolved due to a lack of movement data from free-ranging wild organisms at the scales and resolution relevant for understanding interactions among organisms and with the environment. In this talk, Ran will first introduce the basic concepts of movement ecology. He will then present some exciting developments in our ability to automatically and simultaneously track multiple small animals at high sampling frequency, share some new insights from recent studies carried out in his lab, and highlight the key challenges and opportunities in movement-ecology research. Some examples of questions addressed in his group include What do experienced animals do better than inexperienced ones? Do birds and bats possess a navigational map? and What are the most important “things” in life?

Recent publications:

Harel, R., N. Horvitz, and R. Nathan. 2016. Adult vultures outperform juveniles in challenging thermal soaring conditions. Sci. Rep. 6:27865.

Orchan, Y., O. Ovaskainen, W. Bouten, and R. Nathan. 2016. Novel insights into the map stage of true navigation in non-migratory wild birds (stone curlews, Burhinus oedicnemus). Am. Nat. 187:E152-E165.

Tsoar, A., R. Nathan, Y. Bartan, A. Vyssotski, G. Dell'Omo, and N. Ulanovsky. 2011. Large-scale navigational map in a mammal. PNAS 108:E718-E724.

Nathan, R., W. M. Getz, E. Revilla, M. Holyoak, R. Kadmon, D. Saltz, and P. E. Smouse. 2008. A movement ecology paradigm for unifying organismal movement research. PNAS 105:19052-19059.