Hendry Andrew P, Farrugia Thomas J, Kinnison Michael T
Redpath Museum and Department of Biology, McGill University, 859 Sherbrooke Street West, Montréal, QC, Canada H3A 2K6.
Mol Ecol. 2008 Jan;17(1):20-9. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-294X.2007.03428.x.
Human activities can expose populations to dramatic environmental perturbations, which may then precipitate adaptive phenotypic change. We ask whether or not phenotypic changes associated with human-disturbed (anthropogenic) contexts are greater than those associated with more 'natural' contexts. Our meta-analysis is based on more than 3000 rates of phenotypic change in 68 'systems', each representing a given species in a particular geographical area. We find that rates of phenotypic change are greater in anthropogenic contexts than in natural contexts. This difference may be influenced by phenotypic plasticity - because it was evident for studies of wild-caught individuals (which integrate both genetic and plastic effects) but not for common-garden or quantitative genetic studies (which minimize plastic effects). We also find that phenotypic changes in response to disturbance can be remarkably abrupt, perhaps again because of plasticity. In short, humans are an important agent driving phenotypic change in contemporary populations. Although these changes sometimes have a genetic basis, our analyses suggest a particularly important contribution from phenotypic plasticity.
人类活动会使种群暴露于剧烈的环境扰动中，进而可能促使适应性表型变化的发生。我们探讨与人类干扰（人为）环境相关的表型变化是否大于与更“自然”环境相关的表型变化。我们的荟萃分析基于68个“系统”中3000多个表型变化率，每个“系统”代表特定地理区域内的一个给定物种。我们发现，人为环境中的表型变化率高于自然环境中的表型变化率。这种差异可能受表型可塑性影响——因为在对野生捕获个体的研究中很明显（这些个体综合了遗传和可塑性效应），而在共同花园或数量遗传学研究中则不明显（这些研究将可塑性效应降至最低）。我们还发现，对干扰的表型变化可能非常突然，这或许同样是由于可塑性。简而言之，人类是推动当代种群表型变化的重要因素。虽然这些变化有时有遗传基础，但我们的分析表明表型可塑性有特别重要的贡献。
