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Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard

BACKGROUND: Natural selection is a potent evolutionary force that shapes phenotypic variation to match ecological conditions. However, we know little about the year-to-year consistency of selection, or how inter-annual variation in ecology shapes adaptive landscapes and ultimately adaptive radiation...

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Autores principales: Calsbeek, Ryan, Buermann, Wolfgang, Smith, Thomas B
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2009
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2630972/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19126226
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-9-3
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author Calsbeek, Ryan
Buermann, Wolfgang
Smith, Thomas B
author_facet Calsbeek, Ryan
Buermann, Wolfgang
Smith, Thomas B
author_sort Calsbeek, Ryan
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Natural selection is a potent evolutionary force that shapes phenotypic variation to match ecological conditions. However, we know little about the year-to-year consistency of selection, or how inter-annual variation in ecology shapes adaptive landscapes and ultimately adaptive radiations. Here we combine remote sensing data, field experiments, and a four-year study of natural selection to show that changes in vegetation structure associated with a severe drought altered both habitat use and natural selection in the brown anole, Anolis sagrei. RESULTS: In natural populations, lizards increased their use of vegetation in wet years and this was correlated with selection on limb length but not body size. By contrast, a die-back of vegetation caused by drought was followed by reduced arboreality, selection on body size, and relaxed selection on limb length. With the return of the rains and recovery of vegetation, selection reverted back to pre-drought pattern of selection acting on limb length but not body size. To test for the impact of vegetation loss on natural selection during the drought, we experimentally removed vegetation on a separate study island in a naturally wet year. The experiment revealed similar inter-annual changes in selection on body size but not limb length. CONCLUSION: Our results illustrate the dynamic nature of ecology driving natural selection on Anolis morphology and emphasize the importance of inter-annual environmental variation in shaping adaptive variation. In addition, results illustrate the utility of using remote sensing data to examine ecology's role in driving natural selection.
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spelling pubmed-26309722009-01-27 Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard Calsbeek, Ryan Buermann, Wolfgang Smith, Thomas B BMC Evol Biol Research Article BACKGROUND: Natural selection is a potent evolutionary force that shapes phenotypic variation to match ecological conditions. However, we know little about the year-to-year consistency of selection, or how inter-annual variation in ecology shapes adaptive landscapes and ultimately adaptive radiations. Here we combine remote sensing data, field experiments, and a four-year study of natural selection to show that changes in vegetation structure associated with a severe drought altered both habitat use and natural selection in the brown anole, Anolis sagrei. RESULTS: In natural populations, lizards increased their use of vegetation in wet years and this was correlated with selection on limb length but not body size. By contrast, a die-back of vegetation caused by drought was followed by reduced arboreality, selection on body size, and relaxed selection on limb length. With the return of the rains and recovery of vegetation, selection reverted back to pre-drought pattern of selection acting on limb length but not body size. To test for the impact of vegetation loss on natural selection during the drought, we experimentally removed vegetation on a separate study island in a naturally wet year. The experiment revealed similar inter-annual changes in selection on body size but not limb length. CONCLUSION: Our results illustrate the dynamic nature of ecology driving natural selection on Anolis morphology and emphasize the importance of inter-annual environmental variation in shaping adaptive variation. In addition, results illustrate the utility of using remote sensing data to examine ecology's role in driving natural selection. BioMed Central 2009-01-06 /pmc/articles/PMC2630972/ /pubmed/19126226 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-9-3 Text en Copyright © 2009 Calsbeek et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Calsbeek, Ryan
Buermann, Wolfgang
Smith, Thomas B
Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title_full Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title_fullStr Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title_full_unstemmed Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title_short Parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
title_sort parallel shifts in ecology and natural selection in an island lizard
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2630972/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19126226
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-9-3
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