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231 results for “adaptive plasticity”
Sexual selection buffers the negative consequences of population fragmentation on adaptive plastic responses to increasing temperatures
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Data from: Plasticity versus evolutionary divergence: what causes habitat partitioning in urban-adapted birds?
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Data from: Complex interactions between local adaptation, phenotypic plasticity, and sex affect vulnerability to warming in a widespread marine copepod
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Physiological and environmental data from: Are you ready for the heat? Plasticity vs adaptation of heat tolerance in three-spined stickleback
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Rapid differentiation of plasticity in life history and morphology during invasive range expansion and concurrent local adaptation in the horned beetle Onthophagus taurus
<p>Understanding the interplay between genetic differentiation, ancestral plasticity, and the evolution of plasticity during adaptation to environmental variation is critical to predict populations' responses to environmental change. However, the role of plasticity in rapid adaptation in nature remains poorly understood. We here use the invasion of the horned beetle <i>Onthophagus taurus</i> in the United States during the last half century to study the contribution of ancestral plasticity and post-invasion evolution of plastic responses in rapid population differentiation. We document latitudinal variation in life history and morphology, including genetic compensation in development time and body size, likely adaptive responses to seasonal constraints in the North. However, clinal variation in development time and size was strongly dependent on rearing temperature, suggesting that population differentiation in plasticity played a critical role in successful adaptation on ecological timescales. Clinal variation in wing shape was independent of ancestral plasticity, but correlated with derived plasticity, consistent with evolutionary interdependence. In contrast, clinal variation in tibia shape aligned poorly with thermal plasticity. Overall, this study suggests that post-invasion evolution of plasticity contributed to range expansions and concurrent adaptation to novel climatic conditions.</p>
Contribution of genetic versus plastic responses to adaptive patterns in a widespread butterfly along a latitudinal cline
<p>Understanding how organisms adapt to complex environments is a central goal of evolutionary biology and ecology. This issue is of special interest in the current era of rapidly changing climatic conditions. Here, we investigate clinal variation and plastic responses in life history, morphology, and physiology in the butterfly <i>Pieris napi</i> along a pan-European gradient by exposing butterflies raised in captivity to different temperatures. We found clinal variation in body size, growth rates and concomitant development time, wing aspect ratio, wing melanisation, and heat tolerance. Individuals from warmer environments were more heat-tolerant, had less melanised wings and a shorter development but still they were larger than individuals from cooler environments. These findings suggest selection for rapid growth in the warmth and for wing melanisation in the cold, and thus fine-tuned genetic adaptation to local climates. Irrespective of the origin of butterflies, the effects of higher developmental temperature were largely as expected, speeding up development, reducing body size, potential metabolic activity, and wing melanisation, while increasing heat tolerance. At least in part, these patterns likely reflect adaptive phenotypic plasticity. In summary, our study revealed pronounced plastic and genetic responses, which may indicate high adaptive capacities in our study organism. Whether this may help such species though to deal with current climate change needs further investigation, as clinal patterns have typically evolved over long periods.</p>
Data from : Environmental predictability drives adaptive within- and transgenerational plasticity of heat tolerance across life stages and climatic regions
<p>Although environmental variability and predictability have been proposed as the underlying ecological context in which transgenerational plasticity (<i>TGP</i>) arises, the adaptive significance and interaction with within-generation plasticity (<i>WGP</i>) in such scenarios is still poorly understood. In order to investigate these questions, we considered the tolerance to upper thermal limits of larvae and adults of the desert endemic <i>Drosophila mojavensis </i>adapted to different climatic regions (Desert vs Mediterranean climate). Thermal plasticity was investigated by acclimating parents and offspring at 36°C (versus at 25°C). We then used historical temperature variation data from both regions to perform individual-based simulations by modeling expected components of adaptive plasticity in multiple life stages. Thermal response to ramping heat shocks was more pronounced in larvae, where acclimation treatments in parents and offspring increased their heat-shock performance, while heat knockdown in adults was only increased by offspring acclimation of adults. The relative contribution of <i>WGP</i> and <i>TGP</i> was greater for the population from the more thermally variable Sonoran Desert. Similarly, individual-based simulations of evolving maternal effects indicated that variation in tolerance to upper thermal limits across life stages and climates is expected from its adaptive significance in response to environmental predictability. Our approach offers a new perspective and interpretation of adaptive plasticity, demonstrating that environmental predictability can drive thermal responses across generations and life stages in a scenario with regional climate variability.</p>
Data from: Plasticity-led evolution: evaluating the key prediction of frequency-dependent adaptation
Plasticity-led evolution occurs when a change in the environment triggers a change in phenotype via phenotypic plasticity, and this pre-existing plasticity is subsequently refined by selection into an adaptive phenotype. A critical, but largely untested prediction of plasticity-led evolution (and evolution by natural selection generally) is that the rate and magnitude of evolutionary change should be positively associated with a phenotype's frequency of expression in a population. Essentially, the more often a phenotype is expressed and exposed to selection, the greater its opportunity for adaptive refinement. We tested this prediction by competing against each other spadefoot toad tadpoles from different natural populations that vary in how frequently they express a novel, environmentally induced carnivore ecomorph. As expected, lab-reared tadpoles whose parents were derived from populations that express the carnivore ecomorph more frequently were superior competitors for the resource for which this ecomorph is specialized—fairy shrimp. These tadpoles were better at utilizing this resource both because they were more efficient at capturing and consuming shrimp and because they produced more exaggerated carnivore traits. Moreover, they exhibited these more carnivore-like features even without experiencing the inducing cue, suggesting that this ecomorph has undergone an extreme form of plasticity-led evolution––genetic assimilation. Thus, our findings provide evidence that the frequency of trait expression drives the magnitude of adaptive refinement, thereby validating a key prediction of plasticity-led evolution specifically and adaptive evolution generally.
Data from: Physiological plasticity and local adaptation to elevated pCO2 in calcareous algae: an ontogenetic and geographic approach
To project how ocean acidification will impact biological communities in the future, it is critical to understand the potential for local adaptation and the physiological plasticity of marine organisms throughout their entire life cycle, as some stages may be more vulnerable than others. Coralline algae are ecosystem engineers that play significant functional roles in oceans worldwide, and are considered vulnerable to ocean acidification. Using different stages of coralline algae, we tested the hypothesis that populations living in environments with higher environmental variability and exposed to higher levels of pCO2 would be less affected by high pCO2 than populations from a more stable environment experiencing lower levels of pCO2. Our results show that spores are less sensitive to elevated pCO2 than adults. Spore growth and mortality were not affected by pCO2 level, however elevated pCO2 negatively impacted the physiology and growth rates of adults, with stronger effects in populations that experienced both lower levels of pCO2 and lower variability in carbonate chemistry, suggesting local adaptation. Differences in physiological plasticity and the potential for adaptation could have important implications for the ecological and evolutionary responses of coralline algae to future environmental changes.
Data from: Phenotypic plasticity and adaptive evolution contribute to advancing flowering phenology in response to climate change
Anthropogenic climate change has already altered the timing of major life history transitions, such as the initiation of reproduction. Both phenotypic plasticity and adaptive evolution can underlie rapid phenological shifts in response to climate change but their relative contributions are poorly understood. Here, we combine a continuous 38-year field survey with quantitative genetic field experiments to assess adaptation in the context of climate change. We focused on Boechera stricta (Brassicaeae), a mustard native to the U.S. Rocky Mountains. Flowering phenology advanced significantly from 1973-2011, and was strongly associated with warmer temperatures and earlier snowmelt dates. Strong directional selection favored earlier flowering in contemporary environments (2010-2011). Climate change could drive this directional selection, and promote even earlier flowering as temperatures continue to increase. Our quantitative genetic analyses predict a response to selection of 0.2 to 0.5 days acceleration in flowering per generation, which could account for more than 20% of the phenological change observed in the long-term dataset. However, the strength of directional selection and the predicted evolutionary response are likely much greater now than even 30 years ago because of rapidly changing climatic conditions. We predict that adaptation will likely be necessary for long-term in situ persistence in the context of climate change.
Contribution of genetic versus plastic responses to adaptive patterns in a widespread butterfly along a latitudinal cline
<p>Understanding how organisms adapt to complex environments is a central goal of evolutionary biology and ecology. This issue is of special interest in the current era of rapidly changing climatic conditions. Here, we investigate clinal variation and plastic responses in life history, morphology, and physiology in the butterfly <i>Pieris napi</i> along a pan-European gradient by exposing butterflies raised in captivity to different temperatures. We found clinal variation in body size, growth rates and concomitant development time, wing aspect ratio, wing melanisation, and heat tolerance. Individuals from warmer environments were more heat-tolerant, had less melanised wings and a shorter development but still they were larger than individuals from cooler environments. These findings suggest selection for rapid growth in the warmth and for wing melanisation in the cold, and thus fine-tuned genetic adaptation to local climates. Irrespective of the origin of butterflies, the effects of higher developmental temperature were largely as expected, speeding up development, reducing body size, potential metabolic activity, and wing melanisation, while increasing heat tolerance. At least in part, these patterns likely reflect adaptive phenotypic plasticity. In summary, our study revealed pronounced plastic and genetic responses, which may indicate high adaptive capacities in our study organism. Whether this may help such species though to deal with current climate change needs further investigation, as clinal patterns have typically evolved over long periods.</p>
Data from: Adaptive phenotypic plasticity and local adaptation for temperature tolerance in freshwater zooplankton
Many organisms have geographical distributions extending from the tropics to near polar regions or can experience up to 30°C temperature variation within the lifespan of an individual. Two forms of evolutionary adaptation to such wide ranges in ambient temperatures are frequently discussed: local adaptation and phenotypic plasticity. The freshwater planktonic crustacean Daphnia magna, whose range extends from South Africa to near arctic sites, shows strong phenotypic and genotypic variation in response to temperature. In this study, we use D. magna clones from 22 populations (one clone per population) ranging from latitude 0° (Kenya) to 66° North (White Sea) to explore the contributions of phenotypic plasticity and local adaptation to high temperature tolerance. Temperature tolerance was studied as knockout time (time until immobilization, Timm) at 37°C in clones acclimatized to either 20°C or 28°C. Acclimatization to 28°C strongly increased Timm, testifying to adaptive phenotypic plasticity. At the same time, Timm significantly correlated with average high temperature at the clones' sites of origin, suggesting local adaptation. As earlier studies have found that haemoglobin expression contributes to temperature tolerance, we also quantified haemoglobin concentration in experimental animals and found that both acclimatization temperature (AccT) and temperature at the site of origin are positively correlated with haemoglobin concentration. Furthermore, Daphnia from warmer climates upregulate haemoglobin much more strongly in response to AccT, suggesting local adaptation for plasticity in haemoglobin expression. Our results show that both local adaptation and phenotypic plasticity contribute to temperature tolerance, and elucidate a possible role of haemoglobin in mediating these effects that differs along a cold–warm gradient.
Data from: Does thermal plasticity align with local adaptation? – An interspecific comparison of wing morphology in sepsid flies
Although genetic and plastic responses are sometimes considered as unrelated processes, their phenotypic effects may often align because genetic adaptation is expected to mirror phenotypic plasticity if adaptive, but run counter to it when maladaptive. The magnitude and direction of this alignment has further consequences for both the tempo and mode of adaptation. To better understand the interplay between phenotypic plasticity and genetic change in mediating adaptive phenotypic variation to climate variability, we here quantified genetic latitudinal variation and thermal plasticity in wing loading and wing shape in two closely related and widespread sepsid flies. Common garden rearing of 16 geographical populations reared across multiple temperatures revealed that wing loading decreases with latitude in both species. This pattern could be driven by selection for increased dispersal capacity in the cold. However, although allometry, sexual dimorphism, thermal plasticity and latitudinal differentiation in wing shape all show similar patterns in the two species, the relationship between the plastic and genetic response differed between them. While latitudinal differentiation (south to north) mirrored thermal plasticity (hot to cold) in Sepsis punctum, there was no relationship in Sepsis fulgens. While this suggests that thermal plasticity may have helped to mediate local adaptation in S. punctum, it also demonstrates that genetic wing shape differentiation and its relation to thermal plasticity may be complex and idiosyncratic, even among ecologically similar and closely related species. Hence, genetic responses can, but do not necessarily, align with phenotypic plasticity induced by changing environmental selection pressures.
Data from: A cross-seasonal perspective on local adaptation: metabolic plasticity mediates responses to winter in a thermal-generalist moth
The physiological and ecological impact of the thermal environment across life-stages can result in trade-offs that determine fitness and population dynamics. Understanding mechanisms and consequences of local adaptation for any organism that overwinters requires taking a cross-seasonal perspective. We used a trait-based approach to distinguish variation among ecotypes in ecological and physiological responses to overwintering conditions. We used fall webworms (Hyphantria cunea; Lepidoptera: Arctiidae) from Ottawa, Ontario and Columbus Ohio, representing the centre and periphery of the native range. We hypothesised that populations would be locally adapted to their overwintering environments, with fitness maximised under natal overwintering conditions. We predicted that this local adaptation would result from modulation of rates of energy use, growth and development. Each ecotype had higher overwinter survival in their natal compared to non-natal winter environment, and this was associated with larger pupal mass, size and carbohydrate reserves at the end of winter. This suggests that the ecotypes are locally adapted to winter conditions. Larger adults laid more eggs, but there was no effect of ecotype or environment on fecundity. Pupae overwintering at warm, energetically demanding southern temperatures suppressed metabolic rates in autumn, and developed more quickly in the spring, compensating for energetic demands of warmer winters. Northern ecotypes had lower thermal sensitivity of metabolism, leading to higher metabolic rates at cool temperatures that correlated with faster post-winter development. Local adaptation to winter conditions suggests performance of peripheral populations may not be enhanced by warming winters. Decoupling of winter and growing season temperatures may negatively impact ectotherms.
Phenotypic variability can promote the evolution of adaptive plasticity by reducing the stringency of natural selection
Adaptive phenotypic plasticity is a potent but not ubiquitous solution to environmental heterogeneity, driving interest in what factors promote and limit its evolution. Here a novel computational model representing stochastic information flow in development is used to explore evolution from a constitutive phenotype to an adaptively plastic response. Results show that populations tend to evolve robustness to developmental stochasticity, but this evolved robustness limits evolvability; specifically, robust genotypes have less ability to evolve adaptive plasticity when presented with a mix of both the ancestral environment and a new environment. Analytic calculations and computational experiments confirm that this constraint occurs when the initial mutational steps toward plasticity are pleiotropic, such that mutant fitnesses decline in the environment to which their parents are well-adapted. Greater phenotypic variability improves evolvability in the model by lessening this decline as well as improving the fitness of partial adaptations to the new environment. By making initial plastic mutations more palatable to natural selection, phenotypic variability can increase the evolvability of an innovative, plastic response without improving evolvability to simpler challenges such as a shifted optimum in a single environment. Populations that evolved robustness by negative feedback between the trait and its rate of change show a particularly strong constraining effect on the evolvability of plasticity, revealing another mechanism by which evolutionary history can limit later innovation. These results document a novel mechanism by which weakening selection could actually stimulate the evolution of a major innovation.
Data from: Cold adaptation increases rates of nutrient flow and metabolic plasticity during cold exposure in Drosophila melanogaster
Metabolic flexibility is an important component of adaptation to stressful environments, including thermal stress and latitudinal adaptation. A long history of population genetic studies suggest that selection on core metabolic enzymes may shape life histories by altering metabolic flux. However, the direct relationship between selection on thermal stress hardiness and metabolic flux has not previously been tested. We investigated flexibility of nutrient catabolism during cold stress in Drosophila melanogaster artificially selected for fast or slow recovery from chill coma (i.e. cold-hardy or -susceptible), specifically testing the hypothesis that stress adaptation increases metabolic turnover. Using 13C-labelled glucose, we first showed that cold-hardy flies more rapidly incorporate ingested carbon into amino acids and newly synthesized glucose, permitting rapid synthesis of proline, a compound shown elsewhere to improve survival of cold stress. Second, using glucose and leucine tracers we showed that cold-hardy flies had higher oxidation rates than cold-susceptible flies before cold exposure, similar oxidation rates during cold exposure, and returned to higher oxidation rates during recovery. Additionally, cold-hardy flies transferred compounds among body pools more rapidly during cold exposure and recovery. Increased metabolic turnover may allow cold-adapted flies to better prepare for, resist and repair/tolerate cold damage. This work illustrates for the first time differences in nutrient fluxes associated with cold adaptation, suggesting that metabolic costs associated with cold hardiness could invoke resource-based trade-offs that shape life histories.
Data from: Adaptive patterns of phenotypic plasticity in laboratory and field environments in Drosophila melanogaster
Identifying mechanisms of adaptation to variable environments is essential in developing a comprehensive understanding of evolutionary dynamics in natural populations. Phenotypic plasticity allows for phenotypic change in response to changes in the environment, and as such may play a major role in adaptation to environmental heterogeneity. Here, the plasticity of stress response in D. melanogaster originating from two distinct geographic regions and ecological habitats was examined. Adults were given a short-term, 5-day exposure to combinations of temperature and photoperiod to elicit a plastic response for three fundamental aspects of stress tolerance that vary adaptively with geography. This was replicated in both the laboratory and in outdoor enclosures in the field. In the laboratory, geographic origin was the primary determinant of the stress response. Temperature and the interaction between temperature and photoperiod also significantly affected stress resistance. In the outdoor enclosures, plasticity was distinct among traits and between geographic regions. These results demonstrate that short-term exposure of adults to ecologically relevant environmental cues results in predictable effects on multiple aspects of fitness. These patterns of plasticity vary among traits and are highly distinct between the two examined geographic regions, consistent with patterns of local adaptation to climate and associated environmental parameters.
Data from: Thermal plasticity of growth and development varies adaptively among alternative developmental pathways
Polyphenism, the expression of discrete alternative phenotypes, is often a consequence of a developmental switch. Physiological changes induced by a developmental switch potentially affect reaction norms, but the evolution and existence of alternative reaction norms remains poorly understood. Here, we demonstrate that, in the butterfly Pieris napi (Lepidoptera: Pieridae), thermal reaction norms of several life history traits vary adaptively among switch-induced alternative developmental pathways of diapause and direct development. The switch was affected both by photoperiod and temperature, ambient temperature during late development having the potential to override earlier photoperiodic cues. Directly developing larvae had higher development and growth rates than diapausing ones across the studied thermal gradient. Reaction norm shapes also differed between the alternative developmental pathways, indicating pathway-specific selection on thermal sensitivity. Relative mass increments decreased linearly with increasing temperature and were higher under direct development than diapause. Contrary to predictions, population phenology did not explain trait variation or thermal sensitivity, but our experimental design probably lacks power for finding subtle phenology effects. We demonstrate adaptive differentiation in thermal reaction norms among alternative phenotypes, and suggest that the consequences of an environmentally dependent developmental switch primarily drive the evolution of alternative thermal reaction norms in P. napi.
Data from: Maternal effects in a wild songbird are environmentally plastic but only marginally alter the rate of adaptation
Despite ample evidence for the presence of maternal effects (MEs) in a variety of traits and strong theoretical indications for their evolutionary consequences, empirical evidence to what extent MEs can influence evolutionary responses to selection remains ambiguous. We tested the degree to which MEs can alter the rate of adaptation of a key life-history trait, clutch size, using an individual-based model approach parameterized with experimental data from a long-term study of great tits (Parus major). We modeled two types of MEs: (i) an environmentally plastic ME, in which the relationship between maternal and offspring clutch size depended on the maternal environment via offspring condition, and (ii) a fixed ME, in which this relationship was constant. Although both types of ME affected the rate of adaptation following an abrupt environmental shift, the overall effects were small. We conclude that evolutionary consequences of MEs are modest at best in our study system, at least for the trait and the particular type of ME we considered here. A closer link between theoretical and empirical work on MEs would hence be useful to obtain accurate predictions about the evolutionary consequences of MEs more generally.
Data from: Adaptive plasticity and epigenetic variation in response to warming in an Alpine plant
Environmentally induced phenotypic plasticity may be a critical component of response to changing environments. We examined local differentiation and adaptive phenotypic plasticity in response to elevated temperature in half-sib lines collected across an elevation gradient for the alpine herb, Wahlenbergia ceracea. Using Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism (AFLP), we found low but significant genetic differentiation between low- and high-elevation seedlings, and seedlings originating from low elevations grew faster and showed stronger temperature responses (more plasticity) than those from medium and high elevations. Furthermore, plasticity was more often adaptive for plants of low-elevation origin and maladaptive for plants of high elevation. With methylation sensitive-AFLP (MS-AFLP), we revealed an increase in epigenetic variation in response to temperature in low-elevation seedlings. Although we did not find significant direct correlations between MS-AFLP loci and phenotypes, our results demonstrate that adaptive plasticity in temperature response to warming varies over fine spatial scales and suggest the involvement of epigenetic mechanisms in this response.
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Annotated Behaviour and Observability Dataset (ABODe)
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