The importance of considering the duration of extreme temperatures when investigating responses to climate change.

ABSTRACT: The frequency and duration of heatwaves are increasing because of human activities. To cope with the changes, species with longer generation times may have to rely on plastic responses. The probability that their responses are adaptive is higher if the species have experienced temperature fluctuations also in their evolutionary past. However, experimental studies investigating responses to heatwaves often use exposure times that are significantly shorter than recent heatwaves. We show that this can lead to faulty conclusions and that the duration of higher temperature has to be considered in experimental designs. We recorded the response of threespine stickleback to prolonged duration of higher temperature during the breeding season, using a population that has experienced large fluctuatio

SUBMITTER: Isotalo T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9805119 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature