ArticleEvolutionary applications2019
Local adaptation stops where ecological gradients steepen or are interrupted.
Article in Evolutionary applications, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers.
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17 citing papers in PubMed, 46 citations in OpenAlex.
- Evolution of species' range and niche in changing environments.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Effects of Landscape Compositional Heterogeneity and Spatial Autocorrelation on Environmental Niche and Dispersal in Simulated Organisms.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Impacts of limits to adaptation on population and community persistence in a changing environment.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Virulence Evolution via Pleiotropy in Vector-Borne Plant Pathogens.Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Adaptive colonization across a parasitism-mutualism gradient.Evolution letters · 2024Article
- Genomic signatures of ecological divergence between savanna and forest populations of a Neotropical tree.Annals of botany · 2023Article
- Increasing temporal variance leads to stable species range limits.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Environmental variation and biotic interactions limit adaptation at ecological margins: lessons from rainforestPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Understanding the biology of species' ranges: when and how does evolution change the rules of ecological engagement?Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Introduction to the theme issue 'Species' ranges in the face of changing environments'.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- The role of phenotypic plasticity in the establishment of range margins.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Microclimate and resource quality determine resource use in a range-expanding herbivore.Biology letters · 2021Article
- Eco-evolutionary community turnover following environmental change.Evolutionary applications · 2019Article
- Local adaptation stops where ecological gradients steepen or are interrupted.Evolutionary applications · 2019Article
- Does gene flow aggravate or alleviate maladaptation to environmental stress in small populations?Evolutionary applications · 2019Article
- Implications of existing local (mal)adaptations for ecological forecasting under environmental change.Evolutionary applications · 2019Article
- Causes of maladaptation.Evolutionary applications · 2019Review
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Population genetic models of evolution along linear environmental gradients cannot explain why adaptation stops at ecological margins. This is because, unless models impose reductions in carrying capacity at species' edges, the dominant effect of gene flow is to increase genetic variance and adaptive potential rather than swamping local adaptation. This allows the population to match even very steep changes in trait optima. We extend our previous simulations to explore two nonlinear models of ecological gradients: (a) a sigmoid (steepening) gradient and (b) a linear gradient with a flat centre of variable width. We compare the parameter conditions that allow local adaptation and range expansion from the centre, with those that permit the persistence of a perfectly adapted population distributed across the entire range. Along nonlinear gradients, colonization is easier, and extinction rarer, than along a linear gradient. This is because the shallow environmental gradient near the range centre does not cause gene flow to increase genetic variation, and so does not result in reduced population density. However, as gradient steepness increases, gene flow inflates genetic variance and reduces local population density sufficiently that genetic drift overcomes local selection, creating a finite range margin. When a flat centre is superimposed on a linear gradient, gene flow increases genetic variation dramatically at its edges, leading to an abrupt reduction in density that prevents niche expansion. Remarkably local interruptions in a linear ecological gradient (of a width much less than the mean dispersal distance) can prevent local adaptation beyond this flat centre. In contrast to other situations, this effect is stronger and more consistent where carrying capacity is high. Practically speaking, this means that habitat improvement at patch margins will make evolutionary rescue more likely. By contrast, even small improvements in habitat at patch centres may confine populations to limited areas of ecological space.
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