Ecological and evolutionary drivers of the elevational gradient of diversity

Laiolo, Paola; Pato, Joaquina; Obeso, José Ramón

doi:10.1111/ele.12967

Cited by 75 publications

(75 citation statements)

References 66 publications

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“…We sampled individuals at 23 sites (hereafter populations) located in the Picos de Europa National Park, and the Ponga and Redes Natural Parks, and distributed into six massifs (Figure 1, see Appendix S1, Table S1.1). This area reasonably represents the whole range distribution of the species as it was not found in another 166 sampling sites throughout the Cantabrian Mountains (Laiolo, Pato, & Obeso, 2018). Grasshoppers were collected by hand or using sweep nets mainly in July-November 2011-2013, with a few populations (5) sampled in 2015-2017.…”

Section: Materials S and Me Thodsmentioning

confidence: 87%

The roles of geography, climate and sexual selection in driving divergence among insect populations on mountaintops

Pato

Illera

Obeso

et al. 2019

Journal of Biogeography

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Aim Analysing the drivers of intraspecific variation and how reproductive barriers arise is an essential step to infer the mechanisms of biogeographic differentiation. In populations of a specialized alpine species, we explore the role of geography and climate in the divergence of genetic, morphological and acoustic characters, and analyse the functional consequences of variation on mate choice. Taxon Chorthippus cazurroi (Orthoptera: Caelifera, Acrididae, Gomphocerinae). Location The entire distribution of the species (23 populations from six massifs of the Cantabrian Mountains, NW Spain). Methods First, we analysed the extent of intraspecific spatial divergence and the covariation among climatic niche, genetic (mtDNA), acoustic (song structure) and morphological (body size) traits. Then, we analysed the consequences of phenotypic variation by means of a crossing experiment among populations from different elevations. This served to test for differences in sexual selection among body size‐divergent populations and for the relationship between male traits, female preference and reproduction. Results Genetic, morphologic and acoustic divergence increased with geographic distance. Female morphology was also affected by climate variation, while male one tightly covaried with the song differentiation. Females more closely approached males investing more time in song activities, but weakly responded to the rest of acoustic features and morphological variation. They also distanced themselves slightly more from males from different populations, although this behaviour did not lead to clear differences in reproductive parameters. Main conclusions The process of colonization of mountain massifs has led to significant genetic and phenotypic changes in C. cazurroi. Phenotypic divergence does not constitute a strong intrinsic barrier to reproduction and is largely unpaired from female preference, overall suggesting that sexual selection is a minor actor in the process of differentiation as compared, for instance, to drift. This does not exclude that traits associated with individual condition are under strong selection and, therefore, do not vary so extensively. This study dismisses the idea that alpine specialists with narrow distributions lack genetic and phenotypic variability, and highlights the importance of synthesizing biogeographic and experimental approaches to obtain stronger and deeper inferences about the dynamics and mechanisms of biological differentiation.

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Section: Materials S and Me Thodsmentioning

confidence: 87%

The roles of geography, climate and sexual selection in driving divergence among insect populations on mountaintops

Pato

Illera

Obeso

et al. 2019

Journal of Biogeography

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“…Whereas biodiversity loss is often linked to increased host community competence 89 during community disassembly, the relationship between natural biodiversity gradients and 90 host community competence is less clearly defined (Table 1b). For example, increasing 91 elevation can increase host diversity, decrease host diversity, or generate unimodal diversity 92 patterns, depending on characteristics of the ecosystem, habitat, host taxonomic group, and 93 their interactions (Körner 2007;Wohlgemuth et al 2008;Altermatt et al 2013;Peters et al 94 2016; Laiolo et al 2018). Similarly, increasing elevation can select for more poorly-defended 95 hosts when there is reduced selection for resistance at high elevations (Pellissier et al 2014;96 Kergunteuil et al 2019), but might also favor slow-growing, long-lived, well-defended hosts 97 due to limited resources and stressful environmental conditions at high elevation (Nobis & 98 Schweingruber 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biodiversity loss underlies the dilution effect of biodiversity

Halliday

Rohr

Laine

2020

Preprint

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The dilution effect predicts increasing biodiversity to reduce the risk of infection, but the generality of this effect remains unresolved. Because biodiversity loss generates predictable changes in host community competence, we hypothesized that biodiversity loss might drive the dilution effect. We tested this hypothesis by reanalyzing four previously published meta-analyses that came to contradictory conclusions regarding generality of the dilution effect. In the context of biodiversity loss, our analyses revealed a unifying pattern: dilution effects were inconsistently observed for natural biodiversity gradients, but were commonly observed for biodiversity gradients generated by disturbances causing losses of native biodiversity. Incorporating biodiversity loss into tests of generality of the dilution effect further indicated that scale-dependency may strengthen the dilution effect only when biodiversity gradients are driven by biodiversity loss. Together, these results help to resolve one of the most contentious issues in disease ecology: the generality of the dilution effect.

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“…Robust and generalized inference is made difficult by the complex suite of potentially interacting hypothesized processes (Pianka 1966, Rosenzweig 1995, Lomolino 2001, Currie et al 2004, Mittelbach et al 2007, Laiolo et al 2018). These richness drivers may be causally linked or exert influence through multiple mechanisms (Rosenzweig 1995, Beck et al 2012 with effects contingent on spatial grain and extent (Hortal et al 2010, McGill 2010.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Disentangling elevational richness: a multi‐scale hierarchical Bayesian occupancy model of Colorado ant communities

Szewczyk

McCain

2019

Ecography

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Understanding the forces that shape the distribution of biodiversity across spatial scales is central in ecology and critical to effective conservation. To assess effects of possible richness drivers, we sampled ant communities on four elevational transects across two mountain ranges in Colorado, USA, with seven or eight sites on each transect and twenty repeatedly sampled pitfall trap pairs at each site each for a total of 90 d. With a multi‐scale hierarchical Bayesian community occupancy model, we simultaneously evaluated the effects of temperature, productivity, area, habitat diversity, vegetation structure, and temperature variability on ant richness at two spatial scales, quantifying detection error and genus‐level phylogenetic effects. We fit the model with data from one mountain range and tested predictive ability with data from the other mountain range. In total, we detected 105 ant species, and richness peaked at intermediate elevations on each transect. Species‐specific thermal preferences drove richness at each elevation with marginal effects of site‐scale productivity. Trap‐scale richness was primarily influenced by elevation‐scale variables along with a negative impact of canopy cover. Soil diversity had a marginal negative effect while daily temperature variation had a marginal positive effect. We detected no impact of area, land cover diversity, trap‐scale productivity, or tree density. While phylogenetic relationships among genera had little influence, congeners tended to respond similarly. The hierarchical model, trained on data from the first mountain range, predicted the trends on the second mountain range better than multiple regression, reducing root mean squared error up to 65%. Compared to a more standard approach, this modeling framework better predicts patterns on a novel mountain range and provides a nuanced, detailed evaluation of ant communities at two spatial scales.

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Ecological and evolutionary drivers of the elevational gradient of diversity

Cited by 75 publications

References 66 publications

The roles of geography, climate and sexual selection in driving divergence among insect populations on mountaintops

The roles of geography, climate and sexual selection in driving divergence among insect populations on mountaintops

Biodiversity loss underlies the dilution effect of biodiversity

Disentangling elevational richness: a multi‐scale hierarchical Bayesian occupancy model of Colorado ant communities

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