Summary
This project will improve our ability to predict and manage agricultural pest outbreaks by linking the study of how insects use nutrients with how nitrogen changes in the environment. Locusts are grasshoppers that can transform into large swarms, causing massive agricultural losses and threatening food security around the world. Poor land practices, like overgrazing, decrease the amount of nitrogen in plants, which unexpectedly encourages locusts to form destructive swarms. By using computer modeling, this project will connect how locusts choose and use foods, how nitrogen cycles through their
