Quantitative trait loci (QTL) for thermotolerance were previously identified for adult flies in several mapping populations of Drosophila melanogaster Meigen (Diptera: Drosophilidae) in the laboratory. However, laboratory assays may not necessarily reflect the performance under heat stress in the field. For instance, do the heat‐resistance QTL regions in the field match the QTL for thermotolerance in laboratory studies? To address this and related questions we used a set of recombinant inbred lines (RIL), which were originally used to identify QTL in the laboratory. We tested egg‐to‐adult survival (EAS) QTL in a field experiment under naturally varying heat‐stress temperatures in fly cultures reared on a rotting fruit (banana) in summer. EAS under heat stress was found to be 3–6× lower (depending on RIL) in the field than in the corresponding control at benign temperature (25 °C). Five QTL for EAS were significant in the field experiment under heat stress, four of them co‐located with plasticity QTL, and none of the QTL was significant at control temperature. All significant QTL overlapped (co‐localized) with thermotolerance QTL previously identified in the laboratory. A previously found QTL in the middle of chromosome 2 explained near 30% of the phenotypic variance in EAS under heat stress in previous studies in the laboratory, but this QTL explained only 8% of the EAS variation in our field assay. The largest effect on EAS was found for an X‐linked QTL (cytological range 7B3‐10C3) in the heat‐stress field experiment, explaining a high percentage (14–45%) of the phenotypic variation in EAS. The ecological relevance of QTL implicated in this study is discussed.
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