Mutualism meltdown in insects: bacteria constrain thermal adaptation.
Predicting whether and how organisms will successfully cope with climate change presents critical questions for biologists and environmental scientists. Models require knowing how organisms interact with their abiotic environment, as well understanding biotic interactions that include a network of symbioses in which all species are embedded. Bacterial symbionts of insects offer valuable models to examine how microbes can facilitate and constrain adaptation to a changing environment. While some symbionts confer plasticity that accelerates adaptation, long-term bacterial mutualists of insects are characterized by tight lifestyle constraints, genome deterioration, and vulnerability to thermal stress. These essential bacterial partners are eliminated at high temperatures, analogous to the loss of zooanthellae during coral bleaching. Recent field-based studies suggest that thermal sensitivity of bacterial mutualists constrains insect responses. In this sense, highly dependent mutualisms may be the Achilles' heel of thermal responses in insects.
Duke Scholars
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Related Subject Headings
- Symbiosis
- Microbiology
- Insecta
- Climate Change
- Biological Evolution
- Bacterial Physiological Phenomena
- Animals
- Adaptation, Physiological
- 3107 Microbiology
- 1108 Medical Microbiology
Citation
Published In
DOI
EISSN
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Start / End Page
Related Subject Headings
- Symbiosis
- Microbiology
- Insecta
- Climate Change
- Biological Evolution
- Bacterial Physiological Phenomena
- Animals
- Adaptation, Physiological
- 3107 Microbiology
- 1108 Medical Microbiology