Limited sex differences in plastic responses suggest evolutionary conservatism of thermal reaction norms: A meta-analysis in insects

Temperature has a profound effect on the growth and development of ectothermic animals. However, the extent to which ecologically-driven selection pressures can adjust thermal plastic responses in growth schedules is not well understood. Comparing temperature-induced plastic responses between sexes provides a promising but underexploited approach to evaluating the evolvability of thermal reaction norms: males and females share largely the same genes and immature environments but typically experience different ecological selection pressures. We proceed from the idea that substantial sex differences in plastic responses could be interpreted as resulting from sex-specific life-history optimization, whereas similarity among the sexes should rather be seen as evidence of an essential role of physiological constraints. In this study, we performed a meta-analysis of sex-specific thermal responses in insect development times, using data on 161 species with comprehensive phylogenetic and ecologi...温度对变温动物（ectothermic animals）的生长与发育具有显著影响。然而，生态驱动的选择压力能够在多大程度上调节生长发育时序中的热塑性响应（thermal plastic responses），目前仍未得到充分阐明。比较不同性别间温度诱导的塑性响应，是评估热反应规范（thermal reaction norms）可进化性的一种极具潜力但尚未得到充分挖掘的研究路径：雌雄个体共享绝大多数相同的基因与未成熟发育环境，但通常面临截然不同的生态驱动选择压力。本研究秉持如下核心思路：若塑性响应存在显著性别差异，则可将其归因于针对性别的生活史优化；而雌雄个体间响应模式的相似性，则应被视为生理约束发挥核心调控作用的佐证。在本研究中，我们针对昆虫发育时长的性别特异性热响应开展了一项元分析（meta-analysis），所用数据来自161个物种种群，涵盖了完整的系统发育与生态（ecologi...）相关信息……