The degree of spatial variation relative to temporal variation influences evolution of dispersal

In the face of ongoing global climate an land use change, organisms have multiple possibilities to cope with the modification of their environment. The two main possibilities are to either adapt locall or disperse to a more suitable habitat. The evolution of both local adaptation and dispersal interacts and can be influenced by the spatial and temporal variation (of e.g. temperature or precipitation). In an individual based model (IBM), we explore evolution of phenotypes in landscapes with varying degree of spatial relative to global temporal variation in order to examine it's influence on the evolution of dispersal, niche optimum and niche width.
The relationship between temporal and spatial variation did neither influence the evolution of local adaptation in the niche optimum nor of niche widths. Dispersal probability is highly influenced by the spatio-temporal relationship: with increasing spatial variation, dispersal probability decreases. Additionally, the shape of the distribution...