Scheiner Samuel M, Barfield Michael, Holt Robert D
Division of Environmental Biology National Science Foundation Alexandria VA USA.
Department of Biology University of Florida Gainesville FL USA.
Evol Appl. 2019 Oct 31;13(2):388-399. doi: 10.1111/eva.12876. eCollection 2020 Feb.
The world is changing at a rapid rate, threatening extinction for a large part of the world's biota. One potential response to those altered conditions is to evolve so as to be able to persist in place. Such evolution includes not just traits themselves, but also the phenotypic plasticity of those traits. We used individual-based simulations to explore the potential of an evolving phenotypic plasticity to increase the probability of persistence in the response to either a step change or continual, directional change in the environment accompanied by within-generation random environmental fluctuations. Populations could evolve by altering both their nonplastic and plastic genetic components. We found that phenotypic plasticity enhanced survival and adaptation if that plasticity was not costly. If plasticity was costly, for it to be beneficial the phenotypic magnitude of plasticity had to be great enough in the initial generations to overcome those costs. These results were not sensitive to either the magnitude of the within-generation correlation between the environment of development and the environment of selection or the magnitude of the environmental fluctuations, except for very small phenotypic magnitudes of plasticity. So, phenotypic plasticity has the potential to enhance survival; however, more data are needed on the ubiquity of trait plasticity, the extent of costs of plasticity, and the rate of mutational input of genetic variation for plasticity.
世界正在迅速变化，这对世界上大部分生物群的生存构成了威胁。针对这些变化了的条件，一种可能的应对方式是进行进化，以便能够在原地生存下去。这种进化不仅包括性状本身，还包括这些性状的表型可塑性。我们使用基于个体的模拟方法，来探究进化的表型可塑性在应对环境的阶跃变化或持续的定向变化以及代内随机环境波动时，增加生物种群在原地生存概率的潜力。种群可以通过改变其非可塑性和可塑性遗传成分来实现进化。我们发现，如果表型可塑性没有代价，那么它会提高生物的生存能力和适应能力。如果表型可塑性有代价，那么为了使其有益，在初始世代中可塑性的表型幅度必须足够大，以克服这些代价。除了可塑性的表型幅度非常小的情况外，这些结果对发育环境与选择环境之间的代内相关性大小或环境波动的大小均不敏感。因此，表型可塑性具有提高生物生存能力的潜力；然而，关于性状可塑性的普遍性、可塑性的代价程度以及可塑性遗传变异的突变输入速率，还需要更多的数据。
