Research Interests:
The team's research interests are population ecology, behavioral ecology and evolutionary biology of forest birds in China, with emphasis on the origin, evolution, behavior, ecology and conservation of endemic birds of the Tibetan Plateau alpine conifer forests in China. In the past three decades, we have conducted long-term and in-depth studies on the life history, population dynamics and conservation biology of Chinese grouse (Tetrastes sewerzowi) as the main research object. The research group has fully explored the sexual selection mechanism of Chinese grouse, mainly to investigate the formation and maintenance of monogamy in Chinese grouse. In the first stage of breeding, males occupy the domain and females select males by the quality of the domain. In addition to the Chinese grouse, long-term research work has been carried out on Blood pheasants, Sichuan jay, Sichuan wood owl, and Boreal owl, covering aspects of life history and mating systems. The research group has carried out research work in the direction of behavioral ecology and evolutionary biology in the Lianhuashan area with Passeriformes birds, involving studies on the mechanism of delayed feather maturation in White-bellied redstart, and the effects of predation pressure and habitat differences on the life history strategies of the birds. In recent years, we have conducted multi-faceted research on cognitive behavior and sexual selection mechanisms in birds. The research results have been published in SCI journals such as Communication Biology, The Innovation, Animal Behaviour, Current Zoology, Biological Conservation, AUK, Journal of Ornithology, and Wildlife Biology.
The research group has also been conducting long-term studies on the behavior of field populations of Chestnut thrush in the wild. In the study of the Chestnut thrush, it was found that the Chestnut thrush is monogamous, but there is a high proportion of extra-marital mating. Sexual dimorphism as well as selective pairing of plumage color existed in Chestnut thrush, and this type of mate selection suggests that the physical condition of females affects the selection of males. In addition to finding that Chestnut thrush have a prior pairing behavior pattern, project species studies of Chestnut thrush personalities also found that conflicts between paired individuals reduce offspring reproductive inputs by increasing personality differences. We found that post-pairing sexual selection behavior in Chestnut thrush was significantly associated with individual personality traits, including the proportion of extra-marital matches. These results provide theoretical support and research tools to study the mechanism of sexual selection in the red-bellied thrush. The project can be used as the foundation of this project, and the fundamental theories studied are based on sexual selection to explore the reproductive behavior patterns of birds, with theoretical continuity. The research results were published in Ibis, iScience, Current Zoology, Animal Behaviour, Journal of Ornithology, Avian Research and other animal behavior and ornithology journals.
The group has conducted behavioral experiments with caged birds to further test the theoretical questions and has conducted research on the influence of cognitive behavior on sexual selection in budgerigars. The study has been conducted to determine the personality and cognitive behavior of budgerigars, etc., and significant research results have been obtained on important scientific issues such as cognitive behavior and sexual selection in this species, with the related article "Problem-solving males become more attractive to female budgerigars " was published in the top international journal Science in January 2019. As early as 1871 Darwin suggested in "The Origin of Man and Sexual Selection" that cognitive ability could also be a criterion for sexual selection, but scientists have had difficulty in obtaining conclusive evidence for this in other animals. This work is the first to confirm that cognitive ability in birds can also be a criterion for sexual selection, and it provides important insights for humans to better understand the evolution of cognition.
The research group is currently conducting a study on the genealogical geography of the Chinese grouse and its sister species, the Hazel grouse, using molecular genetics to investigate the mechanisms of plateau adaptation and isolation formation of relict species in the Tibetan Plateau region. The Quaternary historical range of the studied species was reconstructed in conjunction with the species ecological niche model, and the divergence patterns of the species were inferred together with the genealogical relationships. The habitat status, fragmentation, future distribution and conservation benefits of the threatened species were also evaluated, and conservation recommendations for endangered species were proposed from the perspective of conservation biology. The related research results have been published in Zoological Research, BMC Genomics, BMC Ecology and Evolution and other SCI journals related to zoology and genomic research.
Research Projects:
- The fitness effect of personality and the evolutionary mechanisms of Chestnut thrush (2021, 01, 01 – 2024, 12, 31).
- Sexual selection and reproductive adaptation of Golden pheasant (2024, 01, 01 – 2027, 12, 31).