Titel Deelnemers "Korte inhoud" "Life history and eco-evolutionary dynamics in light of the gut microbiota" "Emilie Macke, Martijn Callens, Ellen Decaestecker" "The recent emergence of powerful genomic tools, such as high-throughput genomics, transcriptomics and metabolomics, combined with the study of gnotobiotic animals, have revealed overwhelming impacts of gut microbiota on the host phenotype. In addition to provide their host with metabolic functions that are not encoded in its own genome, evidence is accumulating that gut symbionts affect host traits previously thought to be solely under host genetic control, such as development and behavior. Metagenomics and metatranscriptomics studies further revealed that gut microbial communities can rapidly respond to changes in host diet or environmental conditions through changes in their structural and functional profiles, thus representing an important source of metabolic flexibility and phenotypic plasticity for the host. Hence, gut microbes appear to be an important factor affecting host ecology and evolution which is, however, not accounted for in life-history theory, or in classic population genetics, ecological and eco-evolutionary models. In this forum, we shed new light on life history and eco-evolutionary dynamics by viewing these processes through the lens of host-microbiota interactions. We follow a three-level approach. First, current knowledge on the role of gut microbiota in host physiology and behavior points out that gut symbionts can be a crucial medium of life history strategies. Second, the particularity of the microbiota is based on its multilayered structure, composed of both a core microbiota, under host genetic and immune control, and a flexible pool of microbes modulated by the environment, which differ in constraints on their maintenance and in their contribution to host adaptation. Finally, gut symbionts can drive the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of their host through effects on individual, population, community and ecosystem levels. In conclusion, we highlight some future perspectives for integrative studies to test hypotheses on life history and eco-evolutionary dynamics in light of the gut microbiota." "Consumer-resource dynamics is an eco-evolutionary process in a natural plankton community" "Lynn Govaert, Luc De Meester" "When traits affecting species interactions evolve rapidly, ecological dynamics can be altered while they occur. These eco-evolutionary dynamics have been documented repeatedly in laboratory and mesocosm experiments. We show here that they are also important for understanding community functioning in a natural ecosystem. Daphnia is a major planktonic consumer influencing seasonal plankton dynamics in many lakes. It is also sensitive to succession in its phytoplankton food, from edible algae in spring to relatively inedible cyanobacteria in summer. We show for Daphnia mendotae in Oneida Lake, New York, United States, that within-year ecological change in phytoplankton (from spring diatoms, cryptophytes and greens to summer cyanobacteria) resulted in consumers evolving increasing tolerance to cyanobacteria over time. This evolution fed back on ecological seasonal changes in population abundance of this major phytoplankton consumer. Oneida Lake is typical of mesotrophic lakes broadly, suggesting that eco-evolutionary consumer-resource dynamics is probably common." "Transient eco-evolutionary dynamics and the window of opportunity for establishment of immigrants" "Laurens Kilsdonk, Luc De Meester" "AbstractTo what extent does landscape genetic structure bear the signature of arrival order of lineages during population assembly? Rapid genetic adaptation of resident populations founded by early colonists to local conditions might prevent establishment of later-arriving lineages, resulting in an evolution-mediated priority effect. This might result in a limited window of opportunity for establishment during which the resident population did not have sufficient time yet to monopolize the patch through local adaptation. The length of this window of opportunity is expected to depend on the degree to which early colonists and immigrants are preadapted to local habitat conditions. We present an intraspecific competition model of the initial transient population and evolutionary dynamics that quantifies the window of opportunity for establishment for asexual species. The model explicitly addresses the long-lasting effects of evolution-mediated priority effects by tracking lineages through time. Our results show that the difference in initial preadaptation between early colonists and late immigrants and the speed of evolution codetermine the window of opportunity for establishment. Our results also suggest that local populations should often be dominated by descendants of just a few early colonist lineages and that landscape genetic structure should often reflect the legacy of colonization history." "Integrating fundamental processes to understand eco-evolutionary community dynamics and patterns" "Lynn Govaert, Luc De Meester" "Eco-evolutionary dynamics during range expansion in a herbivorous arthropod" "Katrien Van Petegem" "The earthU+2019s climate has a history of alternating glacial and interglacial periods, which have recurrently forced major rearrangements in species assemblages. Today, however, scientists are worried because the predicted rate of climate change is faster than any of these past temperature changes, and anticipated to have dramatic consequences for the earthU+2019s biodiversity. One way in which species may respond to the current global warming, is by shifting their range pole- or upwards. During such shifts, individuals encounter changing environmental conditions (like a shortened breeding season) and become assorted according to their dispersal capacities (best dispersers at the front). Range shifts thus entail strong selection pressures that may profoundly shape range front phenotypes. This PhD thesis studies the ecological and evolutionary processes related to range shifts, using the two-spotted spider mite (a herbivorous pest that recently expanded its European range northwards) as a model species." "The complexity of urban eco-evolutionary dynamics" "Marina Alberti, Eric P Palkovacs, Simone Des Roches, Luc De Meester, Lynn Govaert, Nancy B Grimm, Nyeema C Harris, Andrew P Hendry, Christopher J Schell" "Urbanization is changing Earth's ecosystems by altering the interactions and feedbacks between the fundamental ecological and evolutionary processes that maintain life. Humans in cities alter the eco-evolutionary play by simultaneously changing both the actors and the stage on which the eco-evolutionary play takes place. Urbanization modifies land surfaces, microclimates, habitat connectivity, ecological networks, food webs, species diversity, and species composition. These environmental changes can lead to changes in phenotypic, genetic, and cultural makeup of wild populations that have important consequences for ecosystem function and the essential services that nature provides to human society, such as nutrient cycling, pollination, seed dispersal, food production, and water and air purification. Understanding and monitoring urbanization-induced evolutionary changes is important to inform strategies to achieve sustainability. In the present article, we propose that understanding these dynamics requires rigorous characterization of urbanizing regions as rapidly evolving, tightly coupled human-natural systems. We explore how the emergent properties of urbanization affect eco-evolutionary dynamics across space and time. We identify five key urban drivers of change - habitat modification, connectivity, heterogeneity, novel disturbances, and biotic interactions - and highlight the direct consequences of urbanization-driven eco-evolutionary change for nature's contributions to people. Then, we explore five emerging complexities - landscape complexity, urban discontinuities, socio-ecological heterogeneity, cross-scale interactions, legacies and time lags - that need to be tackled in future research. We propose that the evolving metacommunity concept provides a powerful framework to study urban eco-evolutionary dynamics." "SEED: A framework for integrating ecological stoichiometry and eco-evolutionary dynamics" "Steven Declerck" "Characterising the extent and sources of intraspecific variation and their ecological consequences is a central challenge in the study of eco-evolutionary dynamics. Ecological stoichiometry, which uses elemental variation of organisms and their environment to understand ecosystem patterns and processes, can be a powerful framework for characterising eco-evolutionary dynamics. However, the current emphasis on the relative content of elements in the body (i.e. organismal stoichiometry) has constrained its application. Intraspecific variation in the rates at which elements are acquired, assimilated, allocated or lost is often greater than the variation in organismal stoichiometry. There is much to gain from studying these traits together as components of an 'elemental phenotype'. Furthermore, each of these traits can have distinct ecological effects that are underappreciated in the current literature. We propose a conceptual framework that explores how microevolutionary change in the elemental phenotype occurs, how its components interact with each other and with other traits, and how its changes can affect a wide range of ecological processes. We demonstrate how the framework can be used to generate novel hypotheses and outline pathways for future research that enhance our ability to explain, analyse and predict eco-evolutionary dynamics." "Dual-stressor selection alters eco-evolutionary dynamics in experimental communities" "Jens Frickel" "Recognizing when and how rapid evolution drives ecological change is fundamental for our understanding of almost all ecological and evolutionary processes such as community assembly, genetic diversification and the stability of communities and ecosystems. Generally, rapid evolutionary change is driven through selection on genetic variation and is affected by evolutionary constraints, such as tradeoffs and pleiotropic effects, all contributing to the overall rate of evolutionary change. Each of these processes can be influenced by the presence of multiple environmental stressors reducing a population's reproductive output. Potential consequences of multistressor selection for the occurrence and strength of the link from rapid evolution to ecological change are unclear. However, understanding these is necessary for predicting when rapid evolution might drive ecological change. Here we investigate how the presence of two stressors affects this link using experimental evolution with the bacterium Pseudomonas fluorescens and its predator Tetrahymena thermophila. We show that the combination of predation and sublethal antibiotic concentrations delays the evolution of anti-predator defence and antibiotic resistance compared with the presence of only one of the two stressors. Rapid defence evolution drives stabilization of the predator-prey dynamics but this link between evolution and ecology is weaker in the two-stressor environment, where defence evolution is slower, leading to less stable population dynamics. Tracking the molecular evolution of whole populations over time shows further that mutations in different genes are favoured under multistressor selection. Overall, we show that selection by multiple stressors can significantly alter eco-evolutionary dynamics and their predictability." "Eco-evolutionary dynamics in freshwater systems" "Luc De Meester, Jelena Pantel" "There is an increasing recognition that evolutionary dynamics may occur at timescales that are sufficiently rapid to impact ecological responses to environmental change and influence ecological dynamics. In the development of the emerging paradigm of eco-evolutionary dynamics, studies of freshwater organisms have been very important. Here we highlight a number of key observations and achievements, and point to remaining challenges." "Neutral processes underlying the macro eco-evolutionary dynamics of mixed-ploidy systems." "Felipe Kauai Pereira, Frederik Mortier, Silvija Milosavljevic, VAN DE PEER YVES"