Assessing rapid evolution in a changing environment.
Climate change poses a serious threat to species persistence. Effective modelling of evolutionary responses to rapid climate change is therefore essential. In this review we examine recent advances in phylogenetic comparative methods, techniques normally used to study adaptation over long periods, which allow them to be applied to the study of adaptation over shorter time scales. This increased applicability is largely due to the emergence of more flexible models of character evolution and the parallel development of molecular technologies that can be used to assess adaptive variation at loci scattered across the genome. The merging of phylogenetic and population genetic approaches to the study of adaptation has significant potential to advance our understanding of rapid responses to environmental change.
Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland. nicolas.salamin@unil.ch
Nicolas
N
Salamin
Rafael O
RO
Wüest
Sébastien
S
Lavergne
Wilfried
W
Thuiller
Peter B
PB
Pearman
D000222:Adaptation, Physiological / Q000235:genetics*; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D057231:Climate Change; D017753:Ecosystem; D008954:Models, Biological; D010802:Phylogeny; D010944:Plants; D011157:Population Dynamics; D013997:Time Factors