Environmental variation and biotic interactions limit adaptation at ecological margins: lessons from rainforest Drosophila and European butterflies.

ABSTRACT: Models of local adaptation to spatially varying selection predict that maximum rates of evolution are determined by the interaction between increased adaptive potential owing to increased genetic variation, and the cost genetic variation brings by reducing population fitness. We discuss existing and new results from our laboratory assays and field transplants of rainforest Drosophila and UK butterflies along environmental gradients, which try to test these predictions in natural populations. Our data suggest that: (i) local adaptation along ecological gradients is not consistently observed in time and space, especially where biotic and abiotic interactions affect both gradient steepness and genetic variation in fitness; (ii) genetic variation in fitness observed in the laboratory is

SUBMITTER: O'Brien EK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8859522 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature