Phenotypic plasticity of a winter-diapause mechanism copes with the effects of summer global warming in an ectothermic predator

Biol Lett. 2024 Jan;20(1):20230481. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2023.0481. Epub 2024 Jan 17.ABSTRACTTo adapt to changes in temperature, animals tend to invest more energy in thermal tolerance to enhance survival, which can have simultaneous costs on plastic traits. Would a decrease in genetic variability, due to global warming, affect the ability of populations with existing metabolic regulatory mechanisms to cope with extreme temperatures? To address this question, we conducted a series of experiments based on the A1B scenario of global warming, assessing within-population genetic variance in (a) morphological traits, (b) metabolic rate allometries, and (c) survival of a winter-diapausing predator ectotherm. Our study focused on the lacewing species Chrysoperla pallida, using both exogamic and endogamic artificial genetic lines. We discovered that both lines use their winter-diapausing phenotype to adapt to summer extreme temperatures caused by extreme heating conditions, but the exogamic line is prone to express phenotypic plasticity in metabolic scaling, with a trade-off between body size and mandible size, i.e. larger individuals tended to develop smaller mandibles to better survive. These findings highlight the significance of substantial phenotypic plasticity and pre-existing metabolic regulatory mechanisms in enabling ectotherms to cope with potential extreme heating occurring in global warming.PMID:38229555 | PMC:PMC10792392 | DOI:10.1098/rsbl.2023.0481

Source: Biology Letters - January 17, 2024 Category: Biology Authors: Hugo Alejandro Álvarez Francisca Ruano Source Type: research