Whether sexual selection impedes or aids adaptation has become an outstanding question in times of rapid environmental change and parallels the debate about how the evolution of individual traits impacts on population dynamics. The net effect of sexual selection on population viability results from a balance between genetic benefits of “good‐genes” effects and costs of sexual conflict. Depending on how these facets of sexual selection are affected under environmental change, extinction of maladapted populations could be either avoided or accelerated. Here, we evolved seed beetles under three alternative mating regimes to disentangle the contributions of sexual selection, fecundity selection, and male–female coevolution to individual reproductive success and population fitness. We compared these contributions between the ancestral environment and two stressful environments (elevated temperature and a host plant shift). We found evidence that sexual selection on males had positive genetic effects on female fitness components across environments, supporting good‐genes sexual selection. Interestingly, however, when males evolved under sexual selection with fecundity selection removed, they became more robust to both temperature and host plant stress compared to their conspecific females and males from the other evolution regimes that applied fecundity selection. We quantified the population‐level consequences of this sex‐specific adaptation and found evidence that the cost of sociosexual interactions in terms of reduced offspring production was higher in the regime applying only sexual selection to males. Moreover, the cost tended to be more pronounced at the elevated temperature to which males from the regime were more robust compared to their conspecific females. These results illustrate the tension between individual‐level adaptation and population‐level viability in sexually reproducing species and suggest that the relative efficacies of sexual selection and fecundity selection can cause inherent sex differences in environmental robustness that may impact demography of maladapted populations.
Sexual selection, environmental robustness and evolutionary 1 demography of maladapted populations: a test using experimental 2 evolution in seed beetles. Abstract 22 Whether sexual selection impedes or aids adaptation has become a pressing question in times 23 of rapid environmental change and parallels the debate about how the evolution of individual 24 traits impacts on population dynamics and viability. The net effect of sexual selection on 25 population viability results from a balance between genetic benefits of "good genes" effects 26 and costs of sexual conflict. Depending on how these facets of sexual selection are affected 27 under environmental change, extinction of maladapted populations could either be avoided or 28 accelerated. Here, we evolved seed beetles under three alternative mating regimes (polygamy, 29 monogamy and male-limited selection) to disentangle the contributions of sexual selection, 30 fecundity selection and male-female coevolution to individual reproductive success and 31 population fitness. We compared these contributions between the ancestral environment and 32 two new stressful environments (temperature and host plant shift). Evolution under polygamy 33 resulted in the highest individual reproductive success in competitive context for both sexes. 34 Moreover, females evolving only via sexual selection on their male siblings in the male-35 limited regime had similar reproductive success and higher fertility than females evolving 36under monogamy, suggesting that sexual selection on males had positive effects on female 37 fitness components. Interestingly, male-limited sexual selection resulted in males that were 38 robust to stress, compared to males from the two evolution regimes applying fecundity 39 selection. We quantified the population-level consequences of this sex-specific adaptation and 40 found evidence that costs of socio-sexual interactions were higher in male-limited lines 41 compared to polygamous lines, and that this difference was particularly pronounced at 42 elevated temperature to which males from the male-limited regime were more robust 43 compared to their conspecific females. These results illustrate the tension between individual-44 level adaptation and population-level viability in sexually reproducing species and suggest 45 that sex-specific selection can cause differences in environmental robustness that may impact 46 population demography under environmental change. 47 48
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