Emergent variability for foraging in unpredictable environments – FORE-SIGHT

Understanding how behavioral variability has evolved in response to environmental fluctuations is crucial for assessing population resilience to climate change. We focus on foraging behavior to investigate how populations balance specialization and diversification of strategies in response to environmental unpredictability. To unravel the multiple sources of behavioral variability, we need to quantify behavior throughout development. Leveraging my unique expertise in computational ethology, we will introduce innovative experimental and computational tools to rigorously measure behavioral variability across scales, from short motor actions to navigation strategies, using machine vision, unsupervised physics-inspired approaches, and simulations to link behavioral sequences with foraging success.

We will compare wild-descended and domesticated zebrafish populations to elucidate how past environmental fluctuations impact behavioral variability. We hypothesize that evolving in highly variable environments poises populations to greater behavioral diversity, driven by neuromodulation—particularly dopamine signaling as a self-reinforcing mechanism. Combining behavioral experiments and RNA-sequencing, we aim to answer: 1) How do motor action sequences influence foraging success? 2) How does developmental variability correlate with environmental unpredictability? 3) How do past environmental conditions shape behavioral variability across populations?

Ultimately, this interdisciplinary project will advance our understanding of behavioral ecology and inform conservation strategies by identifying traits that enhance resilience in changing environments. Additionally, insights onto behavioral development may guide new discoveries in neuroscience, and our observations may inspire efficient algorithms for complex real-world navigation.