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Divergent selection across the landscape can favor the evolution of local adaptation in populations experiencing contrasting conditions. Local adaptation is widely observed in a diversity of taxa, yet we have a surprisingly limited understanding of the mechanisms that give rise to it. For instance, few have experimentally confirmed the biotic and abiotic variables that promote local adaptation, and fewer yet have identified the phenotypic targets of selection that mediate local adaptation. Here, we highlight critical gaps in our understanding of the process of local adaptation and discuss insights emerging from in-depth investigations of the agents of selection that drive local adaptation, the phenotypes they target, and the genetic basis of these phenotypes. We review historical and contemporary methods for assessing local adaptation, explore whether local adaptation manifests differently across life history, and evaluate constraints on local adaptation. 

Since the Industrial Revolution began approximately 200 years ago, global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration ([CO2]) has increased from 270 to 401 µL L−1, and average global temperatures have risen by 0.85°C, with the most pronounced effects occurring near the poles (IPCC, 2013). In addition, the last 30 years were the warmest decades in 1,400 years (PAGES 2k Consortium, 2013). By the end of this century, [CO2] is expected to reach at least 700 µL L−1, and global temperatures are projected to rise by 4°C or more based on greenhouse gas scenarios (IPCC, 2013). Precipitation regimes also are expected to shift on a regional scale as the hydrologic cycle intensifies, resulting in greater extremes in dry versus wet conditions (Medvigy and Beaulieu, 2012). Such changes already are having profound impacts on the physiological functioning of plants that scale up to influence interactions between plants and other organisms and ecosystems as a whole (Fig. 1). Shifts in climate also may alter selective pressures on plants and, therefore, have the potential to influence evolutionary processes. In some cases, evolutionary responses can occur as rapidly as only a few generations (Ward et al., 2000; Franks et al., 2007; Lau and Lennon, 2012), but there is still much to learn in this area, as pointed out by Franks et al. (2014). Such responses have the potential to alter ecological processes, including species interactions, via ecoevolutionary feedbacks (Shefferson and Salguero-Gómez, 2015). In this review, we discuss microevolutionary and macroevolutionary processes that can shape plant responses to climate change as well as direct physiological responses to climate change during the recent geologic past as recorded in the fossil record. We also present work that documents how plant physiological and evolutionary responses influence interactions with other organisms as an example of how climate change effects on plants can scale to influence higher order processes within ecosystems. Thus, this review combines findings in plant physiological ecology and evolutionary biology for a comprehensive view of plant responses to climate change, both past and present. 

A widespread adaptive change in antiherbivore response is seen in a common plant species in urban environments across 160 cities.