Biology subjects

Grandela, A.

Publications and source records attributed to Grandela, A..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2024

Monandrous flies do remate: plastic and evolutionary consequences of heat exposure on mating behaviour and fertility in Drosophila subobscura

Recent work has reinforced the importance of fertility in predicting population persistence under global warming, especially male fertility. However, most studies on mating and reproductive performance have used as model organism polyandrous species, remaining unclear if and how will monandrous species respond. This is unfortunate as one could expect monandrous species to be particularly susceptible, given their inability to use sperm from multiple males to prevent reduced progeny production due to male sterility. It could be that monandrous females can overcome this toll in fertility by plastically changing their mating rate, or that monandrous populations evolve the ability to remate upon repeated exposure to heat. To test this, we studied the real-time evolution as well as the thermal plastic response of two geographically distinct populations of the monandrous species Drosophila subobscura after 45 generations evolving under a warming scenario. We assessed the impact of heat on male mating behaviour and fertility, as well as the impact of reduced male fertility on female mating behaviour and fertility. We found that in males the toll in mating behaviour due to heat can be recovered with time, whereas that in reproductive success cannot. On the other hand, females exposed to heat-stressed males significantly increased their remating rate, allowing to recover considerably their own reproductive success. Interestingly, most responses were plastic, with no striking effect of adaptation to warming nor of geographical origin. Our work brings new insights into the effects of heat on monandrous species and establishes a model to study how a shift in mating system may affect species ability to respond to climate change.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2024

Long-term dynamics of adaptation to a warming environment is dependent on historical background

Global warming is leading to worldwide biodiversity decline at a fast pace. Evolutionary responses may be crucial in allowing organisms to cope with prolonged effects of climate change. This urges the need for a better understanding of the dynamics of adaptation to warming environments. In particular, addressing how reproductive success evolves in deteriorating environments is extremely relevant, as this trait is more likely constrained at lower temperatures than upper physiological thermal limits. Experimental evolution under a warming environment can elucidate the potential of populations to respond to rapid environmental changes. The few studies following such framework lack analysis of long-term response. We here focus on the long-term thermal evolution of two Drosophila subobscura populations, from different European latitudes, under warming temperatures. We estimated the reproductive success of these populations in two test environments: the ancestral (control) and the warming environment after 39 and 52 generations of thermal evolution. We found that a relevant long-term adaptive response to warming temperatures can occur, but the pace of such response is slow. In addition, we observed contrasting responses in the ancestral environmental and differences in the evolutionary dynamics between populations of distinct histories, with those originally from higher latitude only showing an adaptive response under the to the warming environment regime in at a later generation. This study reinforces the need for long-term evolution experiments to fully reveal the potential for thermal response. It also highlights that the scrutiny of several populations in this context is needed for a measure of variation within a species. Accounting for these sources of variation - both temporal and spatial - will allow for more robust assessments of climate change responses.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2022

Biogeographical history shapes evolution of reproduction in a global warming scenario

Adaptive evolution might be critical for animal populations to thrive on the fast-changing natural environments. Ectotherms are particularly vulnerable to global warming and, although their limited coping ability has been suggested, few real-time evolution experiments have directly accessed their evolutionary potential. Here, we report a long-term experimental evolution study addressing the evolution of thermal reaction norms, after [~]30 generations under different thermal environments. We analyzed the evolutionary dynamics of Drosophila subobscura populations as a function of the thermally variable environments in which they evolved and their distinct biogeographical background. Our results showed clear differences between the historically differentiated populations: while the northern D. subobscura populations showed a temporal increase in performance at higher temperatures, their southern counterparts presented the opposite pattern. This suggests that the northern populations might be better equipped to cope with the current rising temperatures. Remarkably, no effect of thermal selection was found. The lack of a clear long-term adaptive response at higher temperatures after evolution under a global warming scenario raises concerns about the evolutionary potential of ectotherms. Our results highlight the complex nature of thermal responses in face of environmental heterogeneity and emphasize the importance of considering intra-specific variation in thermal evolution studies.

evolutionary biology↗