The ‘male escape hypothesis’: sex-biased metamorphosis in response to climatic drivers in a facultatively paedomorphic amphibian

Paedomorphosis is a major evolutionary process that bypasses metamorphosis and allows reproduction in larvae. In newts and salamanders, it can be facultative with paedomorphs retaining gills and metamorphs dispersing. The evolution of these developmental processes is thought to have been driven by t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the Royal Society. B, Biological sciences Biological sciences, 2017-04, Vol.284 (1853), p.20170176-20170176
Main Authors: Mathiron, Anthony G. E., Lena, Jean-Paul, Baouch, Sarah, Denoël, Mathieu
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
adaptation
Amphibians
amphibien
Animals
Aquatic habitats
Aquatic sciences & oceanology
Bayes Theorem
biased sex-ratio
Biodiversity and Ecology
Biological Evolution
Caudata
Climate
Climate change
climate warming
Cost benefit analysis
drought
Drying
Ecology
environmental determinism
Environmental Sciences
Environmental sciences & ecology
Evolution
experiment
Facultative Paedomorphosis
Female
Females
France
Gills
habitat transition
hydroperiod
Hypotheses
Larvae
Larzac
Life prediction
Life sciences
Lissotriton helveticus
Male
Males
Metamorphosis
Metamorphosis, Biological - physiology
Natural populations
Newt
niche shift
palmate newt
polymorphism
polyphenism
Reproduction
Salamandridae
Salamandridae - physiology
Sciences aquatiques & océanologie
Sciences de l’environnement & écologie
Sciences du vivant
Sex
Sex ratio
Temperature
temperature increase
Terrestrial environments
Time Factors
triton palmé
Water availability
Zoologie
Zoology
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Summary:Paedomorphosis is a major evolutionary process that bypasses metamorphosis and allows reproduction in larvae. In newts and salamanders, it can be facultative with paedomorphs retaining gills and metamorphs dispersing. The evolution of these developmental processes is thought to have been driven by the costs and benefits of inhabiting aquatic versus terrestrial habitats. In this context, we aimed at testing the hypothesis that climatic drivers affect phenotypic transition and the difference across sexes because sex-ratio is biased in natural populations. Through a replicated laboratory experiment, we showed that paedomorphic palmate newts (Lissotriton helveticus) metamorphosed at a higher frequency when water availability decreased and metamorphosed earlier when temperature increased in these conditions. All responses were sex-biased, and males were more prone to change phenotype than females. Our work shows how climatic variables can affect facultative paedomorphosis and support theoretical models predicting life on land instead of in water. Moreover, because males metamorphose and leave water more often and earlier than females, these results, for the first time, give an experimental explanation for the rarity of male paedomorphosis (the ‘male escape hypothesis’) and suggest the importance of sex in the evolution of paedomorphosis versus metamorphosis.
ISSN:0962-8452
1471-2954
1471-2954
DOI:10.1098/rspb.2017.0176