Phenotypic plasticity, but not adaptive tracking, underlies seasonal variation in post-cold hardening freeze tolerance of Drosophila melanogaster.

ABSTRACT: In temperate regions, an organism's ability to rapidly adapt to seasonally varying environments is essential for its survival. In response to seasonal changes in selection pressure caused by variation in temperature, humidity, and food availability, some organisms exhibit plastic changes in phenotype. In other cases, seasonal variation in selection pressure can rapidly increase the frequency of genotypes that offer survival or reproductive advantages under the current conditions. Little is known about the relative influences of plastic and genetic changes in short-lived organisms experiencing seasonal environmental fluctuations. Cold hardening is a seasonally relevant plastic response in which exposure to cool, but nonlethal, temperatures significantly increases the organism's ability to l

SUBMITTER: Stone HM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6972814 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature