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1. Understanding Organismal Capacity to Respond to Anthropogenic Change: Barriers and Solutions

   https://doi.org/10.1093/icb/icab162  

   Gabor, Caitlin R ; Kivlin, Stephanie N ; Hua, Jessica ; Bickford, Nate ; Reiskind, Martha O ; Wright, Timothy F ( July 2021 , Integrative and Comparative Biology)

   null (Ed.)

   Synopsis Global environmental changes induced by human activities are forcing organisms to respond at an unprecedented pace. At present we have only a limited understanding of why some species possess the capacity to respond to these changes while others do not. We introduce the concept of multidimensional phenospace as an organizing construct to understanding organismal evolutionary responses to environmental change. We then describe five barriers that currently challenge our ability to understand these responses: (1) Understanding the parameters of environmental change and their fitness effects, (2) Mapping and integrating phenotypic and genotypic variation, (3) Understanding whether changes in phenospace are heritable, (4) Predicting consistency of genotype to phenotype patterns across space and time, and (5) Determining which traits should be prioritized to understand organismal response to environmental change. For each we suggest one or more solutions that would help us surmount the barrier and improve our ability to predict, and eventually manipulate, organismal capacity to respond to anthropogenic change. Additionally, we provide examples of target species that could be useful to examine interactions between phenotypic plasticity and adaptive evolution in changing phenospace. 

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2. Accounting for nonlinear responses to traits improves range shift predictions

   https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.4860  

   Cannistra, Anthony_F ; Buckley, Lauren_B ( June 2024 , Ecosphere)

   Accurately predicting species' range shifts in response to environmental change is paramount for understanding ecological processes and global change. In synthetic analyses, traits emerge as significant but weak predictors of species' range shifts across recent climate change. These studies assume linear responses to traits, while detailed empirical work often reveals trait responses that are unimodal and contain thresholds or other nonlinearities. We hypothesize that the use of linear modeling approaches fails to capture these nonlinearities and, therefore, may be under‐powering traits to predict range shifts. We evaluate the predictive performance of approaches that can capture nonlinear relationships (ridge‐regularized linear regression, support vector regression with linear and nonlinear kernels, and random forests). We apply our models using six multidecadal range shift datasets for plants, moths, marine fish, birds, and small mammals. We show that nonlinear approaches can perform better than least‐squares linear modeling in reproducing historical range shifts. Consistent with expectations, we identify dispersal and climatic niche traits as primary determinants of distribution shifts. Traits identified as important predictors and the direction of trait effects are generally consistent across models, but there are notable exceptions. Among important predictors, there are more consistent responses to climatic niches than dispersal ability. Modest improvements in predictability when accounting for nonlinearities and interactions, and the overall low amount of variance accounted for by trait predictors suggest limits to trait‐based statistical predictive frameworks.

    

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3. Vertebrate Phenological Plasticity: From Molecular Mechanisms to Ecological and Evolutionary Implications

   https://doi.org/10.1093/icb/icac121  

   Aubry, Lise M. ; Williams, Cory T. ( July 2022 , Integrative and Comparative Biology)

   Seasonal variation in the availability of essential resources is one of the most important drivers of natural selection on the phasing and duration of annually recurring life-cycle events. Shifts in seasonal timing are among the most commonly reported responses to climate change and the capacity of organisms to adjust their timing, either through phenotypic plasticity or evolution, is a critical component of resilience. Despite growing interest in documenting and forecasting the impacts of climate change on phenology, our ability to predict how individuals, populations, and species might alter their seasonal timing in response to their changing environments is constrained by limited knowledge regarding the cues animals use to adjust timing, the endogenous genetic and molecular mechanisms that transduce cues into neural and endocrine signals, and the inherent capacity of animals to alter their timing and phasing within annual cycles. Further, the fitness consequences of phenological responses are often due to biotic interactions within and across trophic levels, rather than being simple outcomes of responses to changes in the abiotic environment. Here, we review the current state of knowledge regarding the mechanisms that control seasonal timing in vertebrates, as well as the ecological and evolutionary consequences of individual, population, and species-level variation in phenological responsiveness. Understanding the causes and consequences of climate-driven phenological shifts requires combining ecological, evolutionary, and mechanistic approaches at individual, populational, and community scales. Thus, to make progress in forecasting phenological responses and demographic consequences, we need to further develop interdisciplinary networks focused on climate change science.

    

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4. A conceptual framework for understanding stress-induced physiological and transgenerational effects on population responses to climate change

   https://doi.org/10.1093/evlett/qrad037  

   Crino, Ondi L ; Bonduriansky, Russell ; Martin, Lynn B ; Noble, Daniel W ( September 2023 , Evolution Letters)

   Organisms are experiencing higher average temperatures and greater temperature variability because of anthropogenic climate change. Some populations respond to changes in temperature by shifting their ranges or adjusting their phenotypes via plasticity and/or evolution, while others go extinct. Predicting how populations will respond to temperature changes is challenging because extreme and unpredictable climate changes will exert novel selective pressures. For this reason, there is a need to understand the physiological mechanisms that regulate organismal responses to temperature changes. In vertebrates, glucocorticoid hormones mediate physiological and behavioral responses to environmental stressors and thus are likely to play an important role in how vertebrates respond to global temperature changes. Glucocorticoids have cascading effects that influence the phenotype and fitness of individuals, and some of these effects can be transmitted to offspring via trans- or intergenerational effects. Consequently, glucocorticoid-mediated responses could affect populations and could even be a powerful driver of rapid evolutionary change. Here, we present a conceptual framework that outlines how temperature changes due to global climate change could affect population persistence via glucocorticoid responses within and across generations (via epigenetic modifications). We briefly review glucocorticoid physiology, the interactions between environmental temperatures and glucocorticoid responses, and the phenotypic consequences of glucocorticoid responses within and across generations. We then discuss possible hypotheses for how glucocorticoid-mediated phenotypic effects might impact fitness and population persistence via evolutionary change. Finally, we pose pressing questions to guide future research. Understanding the physiological mechanisms that underpin the responses of vertebrates to elevated temperatures will help predict population-level responses to the changing climates we are experiencing.

    

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5. Climate Disruption of Plant-Microbe Interactions

   https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-011720-090819  

   Rudgers, Jennifer A. ; Afkhami, Michelle E. ; Bell-Dereske, Lukas ; Chung, Y. Anny ; Crawford, Kerri M. ; Kivlin, Stephanie N. ; Mann, Michael A. ; Nuñez, Martin A. ( November 2020 , Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics)

   null (Ed.)

   Interactions between plants and microbes have important influences on evolutionary processes, population dynamics, community structure, and ecosystem function. We review the literature to document how climate change may disrupt these ecological interactions and develop a conceptual framework to integrate the pathways of plant-microbe responses to climate over different scales in space and time. We then create a blueprint to aid generalization that categorizes climate effects into changes in the context dependency of plant-microbe pairs, temporal mismatches and altered feedbacks over time, or spatial mismatches that accompany species range shifts. We pair a new graphical model of how plant-microbe interactions influence resistance to climate change with a statistical approach to predictthe consequences of increasing variability in climate. Finally, we suggest pathways through which plant-microbe interactions can affect resilience during recovery from climate disruption. Throughout, we take a forward-looking perspective, highlighting knowledge gaps and directions for future research. 

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