spatial patterns of directional phenotypic selection

Local adaptation, adaptive population divergence and speciation are often expected to result from populations evolving in response to spatial variation in selection. Yet, we lack a comprehensive understanding of the major features that characterise the spatial patterns of selection, namely the exten...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ecology letters 2013-11, Vol.16 (11), p.1382-1392
Main Authors: Siepielski, Adam M, Gotanda, Kiyoko M, Morrissey, Michael B, Diamond, Sarah E, DiBattista, Joseph D, Carlson, Stephanie M, Thrall, Peter
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adaptation
Adaptation, Physiological - genetics
adaptive radiation
Animal and plant ecology
Animal reproduction
Animal, plant and microbial ecology
Animals
Biological and medical sciences
Biological Evolution
data collection
Demography
Ecosystem
environmental variation
evolution
Evolutionary biology
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
General aspects
Genotype & phenotype
local adaptation
natural selection
phenotype
population
Population genetics
selection mosaic
Selection, Genetic
sexual selection
spatial variation
temporal variation
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Summary:Local adaptation, adaptive population divergence and speciation are often expected to result from populations evolving in response to spatial variation in selection. Yet, we lack a comprehensive understanding of the major features that characterise the spatial patterns of selection, namely the extent of variation among populations in the strength and direction of selection. Here, we analyse a data set of spatially replicated studies of directional phenotypic selection from natural populations. The data set includes 60 studies, consisting of 3937 estimates of selection across an average of five populations. We performed meta‐analyses to explore features characterising spatial variation in directional selection. We found that selection tends to vary mainly in strength and less in direction among populations. Although differences in the direction of selection occur among populations they do so where selection is often weakest, which may limit the potential for ongoing adaptive population divergence. Overall, we also found that spatial variation in selection appears comparable to temporal (annual) variation in selection within populations; however, several deficiencies in available data currently complicate this comparison. We discuss future research needs to further advance our understanding of spatial variation in selection.
ISSN:1461-023X
1461-0248
DOI:10.1111/ele.12174