4.4 Article

Spatial Selection and Local Adaptation Jointly Shape Life-History Evolution during Range Expansion

Journal

AMERICAN NATURALIST
Volume 188, Issue 5, Pages 485-498

Publisher

UNIV CHICAGO PRESS
DOI: 10.1086/688666

Keywords

global change; Tetranychus urticae; quantitative genetic trait divergence; pattern-oriented modeling; dispersal evolution; sawtooth pattern

Funding

  1. Fund for Scientific Research-Flanders (FWO) [G.0610.11]
  2. BelSpo Interuniversity Attraction Poles Project Speedy
  3. Ghent University
  4. Hercules Foundation
  5. Flemish government (Department of Economy, Science, and Innovation)

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In the context of climate change and species invasions, range shifts increasingly gain attention because the rates at which they occur in the Anthropocene induce rapid changes in biological assemblages. During range shifts, species experience multiple selection pressures. For poleward expansions in particular, it is difficult to interpret observed evolutionary dynamics because of the joint action of evolutionary processes related to spatial selection and to adaptation toward local climatic conditions. To disentangle the effects of these two processes, we integrated stochastic modeling and data from a common garden experiment, using the spider mite Tetranychus urticae as a model species. By linking the empirical data with those derived form a highly parameterized individual-based model, we infer that both spatial selection and local adaptation contributed to the observed latitudinal life-history divergence. Spatial selection best described variation in dispersal behavior, while variation in development was best explained by adaptation to the local climate. Divergence in life-history traits in species shifting poleward could consequently be jointly determined by contemporary evolutionary dynamics resulting from adaptation to the environmental gradient and from spatial selection. The integration of modeling with common garden experiments provides a powerful tool to study the contribution of these evolutionary processes on life-history evolution during range expansion.

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