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1. No evidence of predicted phenotypic changes after hurricane disturbance in a shade-specialist Caribbean anole

   https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0152  

   Acevedo, Miguel A.; Clark, David; Fankhauser, Carly; Toohey, John Michael (August 2022, Biology Letters)

   Extreme climatic events (ECEs) such as hurricanes have been hypothesized to be a major driving force of natural selection. Recent studies argue that, following strong hurricane disturbance, Anolis lizards in the Caribbean undergo selection for traits such as longer forelimbs or smaller body sizes that improve their clinging ability to their substrates increasing their chances of surviving hurricane wind gusts. Some authors challenge the generalization of this hypothesis arguing that other mechanisms may explain these phenotypic changes or that they may not necessarily be generalizable across systems. To address this issue, we compared body size and relative forelimb length of Anolis gundlachi , a trunk–ground anole living in closed-canopy forests in Puerto Rico, before, four months after, and 15 months after Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017. Overall, our results show no clear evidence of a temporal decrease in body size or increase forelimb length (relative to body size) challenging the generalizability of the clinging ability hypothesis. Understanding how animals adapt to ECE is an emerging field. Still, we are quickly learning that this process is complex and nuanced. 

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2. Variation in tail morphology across urban and forest populations of the crested anole (Anolis cristatellus)

   https://doi.org/10.1093/biolinnean/blz111  

   Prado-Irwin, Sofia R; Revell, Liam J; Winchell, Kristin M (August 2019, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society)

   Abstract Anolis lizards are well known for their specialist ecomorphs characterized by the convergent evolution of suites of traits linked to the use of particular microhabitats. Many of these same traits evolve rapidly in response to novel selection pressures and have been very well studied. In contrast, the tail crest, a feature present in a subset of lineages, has been almost entirely overlooked. Variation in tail crest morphology within and among species remains largely unstudied, as does the function of the trait. Here, we use the natural experiment provided by urbanization to ask whether tail crest size differs between urban and forest populations of the crested anole (Anolis cristatellus) across the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico. We find that tail crest size differs primarily between regions; however, within regions, crests are invariably larger in urban than in forest environments. This difference in size is correlated with the hotter, drier conditions and sparser distribution of perches that typify urban sites, leading to the intriguing possibility that the tail crest might be under differential natural selection for signalling and/or because of the thermoregulatory challenge of urban habitats. Further study is required to shed light on the functional significance and evolution of this under-studied trait. 

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3. A high-quality genome for the slender anole ( Anolis apletophallus ): an emerging model for field studies of tropical ecology and evolution

   https://doi.org/10.1093/g3journal/jkad248  

   Pirani, Renata M.; Arias, Carlos F.; Charles, Kristin; Chung, Albert K.; Curlis, John David; Nicholson, Daniel J.; Vargas, Marta; Cox, Christian L.; McMillan, W. Owen; Logan, Michael L.; et al (October 2023, G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics)

   Abstract The slender anole, Anolis apletophallus, is a small arboreal lizard of the rainforest understory of central and eastern Panama. This species has been the subject of numerous ecological and evolutionary studies over the past 60 years as a result of attributes that make it especially amenable to field and laboratory science. Slender anoles are highly abundant, short-lived (nearly 100% annual turnover), easy to manipulate in both the lab and field, and are ubiquitous in the forests surrounding the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, where researchers have access to high-quality laboratory facilities. Here, we present a high-quality genome for the slender anole, which is an important new resource for studying this model species. We assembled and annotated the slender anole genome by combining 3 technologies: Oxford Nanopore, 10× Genomics Linked-Reads, and Dovetail Omni-C. We compared this genome with the recently published brown anole (Anolis sagrei) and the canonical green anole (Anolis carolinensis) genomes. Our genome is the first assembled for an Anolis lizard from mainland Central or South America, the regions that host the majority of diversity in the genus. This new reference genome is one of the most complete genomes of any anole assembled to date and should facilitate deeper studies of slender anole evolution, as well as broader scale comparative genomic studies of both mainland and island species. In turn, such studies will further our understanding of the well-known adaptive radiation of Anolis lizards. 

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4. The drivers and consequences of unstable Plasmodium dynamics: a long-term study of three malaria parasite species infecting a tropical lizard

   https://doi.org/10.1017/S0031182018001750  

   Otero, Luisa; Schall, Jos J.; Cruz, Virnaliz; Aaltonen, Kristen; Acevedo, Miguel A. (April 2019, Parasitology)

   Abstract Understanding the consequences of environmental fluctuations for parasite dynamics requires a long-term view stretching over many transmission cycles. Here we studied the dynamics of three malaria parasites ( Plasmodium azurophilum , P. leucocytica and P. floridense ) infecting the lizard Anolis gundlachi , in the rainforest of Puerto Rico. In this malaria–anole system we evaluated temporal fluctuations in individual probability of infection, the environmental drivers of observed variation and consequences for host body condition and Plasmodium parasites assemblage. We conducted a total of 15 surveys including 10 from 1990 to 2002 and five from 2015 to 2017. During the early years, a lizard's probability of infection by all Plasmodium species appeared stable despite disturbances ranging from two hurricanes to short droughts. Over a longer timescale, probability of infection and overall prevalence varied significantly, following non-linear relationships with temperature and rainfall such that highest prevalence is expected at intermediate climate measures. A perplexing result was that host body condition was maximized at intermediate levels of rainfall and/or temperature (when risk of infection was highest), yet we found no significant decreases in body condition due to infection. Plasmodium parasite species composition varied through time with a reduction and near local extinction of P. floridense . Our results emphasize the need for long-term studies to reveal host–parasite dynamics, their drivers and consequences. 

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5. Identifying individual and spatial drivers of heterogeneous transmission and virulence of malaria in Caribbean anoles

   https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.4297  

   Toohey, John M.; Otero, Luisa; Flores Siaca, Ian G.; Acevedo, Miguel A. (December 2022, Ecosphere)

   Abstract Heterogeneous distributions are a fundamental principle of ecology, manifesting as natural variability within ecological levels of organization from individuals to ecosystems. In disease ecology, variability in biotic and abiotic factors can result in heterogeneous patterns of transmission and virulence—broadly defined here as the negative consequences of infection. Still, our classic theoretical understanding of disease dynamics comes from models that assume homogeneous transmission and virulence. Here, we test this assumption by assessing the contribution of various sources of individual and spatial heterogeneity to patterns of transmission and sublethal measurements of virulence in two lizard–malaria systems: a three‐parasite assemblage (Plasmodium floridense,Plasmodium leukocytica, andPlasmodium azurophilum) infecting the lizardAnolis gundlachiin the rainforest of Puerto Rico and a single‐parasite system (P. floridense–Anolis sagrei) in Florida. Using a Bayesian model selection framework, we evaluated whether individual host differences (i.e., body size and sex) or spatial variability (i.e., habitat type and local‐scale host spatial structure) drive heterogeneity in the probability of infection or its associated health costs (i.e., body condition, blood chemistry). We found that the probability of infection increases with increasing lizard body size in both systems. However, in Florida, we found the relationship to be subdued in deforested habitats compared to the adjacent urban hydric forests. Furthermore, infection was spatially clustered within sampling sites, with “hot” and “cold” spots across the landscape. Nevertheless, we found no clear evidence of costs of infection on lizard health in any of the measures assessed and hence no grounds for inference regarding heterogeneous virulence. Ultimately, the consistency of our results across systems suggests prominent roles of individual and spatial heterogeneities as driving factors of transmission of vector‐borne diseases. 

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