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Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates
Sexual size dimorphism (SSD) is widespread in animals, especially in lizards (Reptilia: Squamata), and is driven by fecundity selection, male–male competition, or other adaptive hypotheses. However, these selective pressures may vary through different life history periods; thus, it is essential to a...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
John Wiley and Sons Inc.
2019
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6636199/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31346437 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5358 |
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author | Yang, Chen Zhao, Jinming Diaz, Raul E. Lyu, Nan |
author_facet | Yang, Chen Zhao, Jinming Diaz, Raul E. Lyu, Nan |
author_sort | Yang, Chen |
collection | PubMed |
description | Sexual size dimorphism (SSD) is widespread in animals, especially in lizards (Reptilia: Squamata), and is driven by fecundity selection, male–male competition, or other adaptive hypotheses. However, these selective pressures may vary through different life history periods; thus, it is essential to assess the relationship between growth and SSD. In this study, we tracked SSD dynamics between a “fading‐tail color skink” (blue tail skink whose tail is only blue during its juvenile stage: Plestiodon elegans) and a “nonfade color” tail skink (retains a blue tail throughout life: Plestiodon quadrilineatus) under a controlled experimental environment. We fitted growth curves of morphological traits (body mass, SVL, and TL) using three growth models (Logistic, Gompertz, and von Bertalanffy). We found that both skinks have male‐biased SSD as adults. Body mass has a higher goodness of fit (as represented by very high R (2) values) using the von Bertalanffy model than the other two models. In contrast, SVL and TL for both skinks had higher goodness of fit when using the Gompertz model. Two lizards displayed divergent life history tactics: P. elegans grows faster, matures earlier (at 65 weeks), and presents an allometric growth rate, whereas P. quadrilineatus grows slower, matures later (at 106 weeks), and presents an isometric growth rate. Our findings imply that species‐ and sex‐specific trade‐offs in the allocation of energy to growth and reproduction may cause the growth patterns to diverge, ultimately resulting in the dissimilar patterns of SSD. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6636199 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-66361992019-07-25 Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates Yang, Chen Zhao, Jinming Diaz, Raul E. Lyu, Nan Ecol Evol Original Research Sexual size dimorphism (SSD) is widespread in animals, especially in lizards (Reptilia: Squamata), and is driven by fecundity selection, male–male competition, or other adaptive hypotheses. However, these selective pressures may vary through different life history periods; thus, it is essential to assess the relationship between growth and SSD. In this study, we tracked SSD dynamics between a “fading‐tail color skink” (blue tail skink whose tail is only blue during its juvenile stage: Plestiodon elegans) and a “nonfade color” tail skink (retains a blue tail throughout life: Plestiodon quadrilineatus) under a controlled experimental environment. We fitted growth curves of morphological traits (body mass, SVL, and TL) using three growth models (Logistic, Gompertz, and von Bertalanffy). We found that both skinks have male‐biased SSD as adults. Body mass has a higher goodness of fit (as represented by very high R (2) values) using the von Bertalanffy model than the other two models. In contrast, SVL and TL for both skinks had higher goodness of fit when using the Gompertz model. Two lizards displayed divergent life history tactics: P. elegans grows faster, matures earlier (at 65 weeks), and presents an allometric growth rate, whereas P. quadrilineatus grows slower, matures later (at 106 weeks), and presents an isometric growth rate. Our findings imply that species‐ and sex‐specific trade‐offs in the allocation of energy to growth and reproduction may cause the growth patterns to diverge, ultimately resulting in the dissimilar patterns of SSD. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2019-06-14 /pmc/articles/PMC6636199/ /pubmed/31346437 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5358 Text en © 2019 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Original Research Yang, Chen Zhao, Jinming Diaz, Raul E. Lyu, Nan Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title | Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title_full | Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title_fullStr | Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title_full_unstemmed | Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title_short | Development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
title_sort | development of sexual dimorphism in two sympatric skinks with different growth rates |
topic | Original Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6636199/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31346437 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5358 |
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