Rapid evolution and species coexistence under environmental fluctuations

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K16223
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 45040:Ecology and environment-related
• Research Institution: National Institute of Genetics (2023); Nagasaki University (2019-2022)
• Principal Investigator: Yamamichi Masato 国立遺伝学研究所, 新分野創造センター, 准教授 (70734804)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: 迅速な進化 / 多種共存 / ストレージ効果 / 相対的非線形性 / 環境変動 / 絶滅 / 適応 / 表現型可塑性

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Rapid contemporary evolution, the adaptive change of gene frequencies in organismal populations, can affect ecological processes including population dynamics, community structure, and ecosystem functioning. As ecological processes change fitness landscape and affect evolution, feedbacks can occur between rapid evolution and ecological processes. However, few studies have explored the role of rapid evolution in the central question of community ecology: "how do competing species stably coexist despite competition for resources?" In this research project, we clarify the eco-evolutionary dynamics in which genetic and species diversity interact under temporal fluctuations of environments through mathematical model analyses and numerical simulations, and consider the eco-evolutionary feedbacks through the lens of Chesson's coexistence theory.

Free Research Field

生態学・進化生物学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

人間活動により地球環境が大きく変化し、外来種が増えていく中で、多くの種が絶滅し生物多様性が減少しつつある。生物多様性を安定的に存続させることを目指す際には、環境変動のもとでの迅速な適応進化と多種の安定共存の動態を理解することが重要となる。本研究は、個体数と進化の間に複雑なフィードバックが起こることで安定共存が起こりうることを示し、共存理論を発展させるとともに、種多様性と同時に遺伝的多様性を保全することの重要性を明らかにした。