Evolvability predicts macroevolution under fluctuating selection

Heritable variation is a prerequisite for evolutionary change. Yet, whether genetic potential for microevolution is relevant on macroevolutionary timescales is debated. Here we show that evolutionary divergence among populations, and to a lesser extent among species, increases with microevolutionary evolvability in both extant and extinct taxa. We evaluate and reject a number of hypotheses put forward to explain this relationship and propose that an effect of evolvability on population and species divergence can be explained by the influence of genetic constraints on population’s ability to track rapid stationary environmental fluctuations.

Methods
The data is collected from the primary scientific literature and consists of two independent meta datasets. One meta dataset contains contemporary populations and species and the other is comprised of fossil time series. The contemporary data is comprised of traits on a ratio scale with the requirements of having at least two populations (or species) means and one genetic variation estimate.

The fossil data is retrieved from the database curated by Kjetil L. Voje:
K. L. Voje, Phenotypic Evolution Time Series (PETS) Database, version 1.0 (2023). https://pets.nhm.uio.no

It is comprised of time series that follow one lineage through time, and the samples can be considered as populations sampled from the same lineage through time. We required one or more traits to be measured, with a minimum of two time steps. The trait was also required to be on ratio scale.