From coral reefs to Joshua trees: What ecological interactions teach us about the adaptive capacity of biodiversity in the Anthropocene.

Humans now hugely manipulate the environment (intentionally and not), so much so that today we live in a time where it seems the only constant is change. Thus, biodiversity globally is faced with unprecedented, rapid, and extreme changes to its environment, which may drive selection for evolvability. In other words, under these conditions, natural (or arguably, unnatural) selection will favor those species with greater abilities to change (i.e., greater adaptive capacities). Here, we evaluate how the differential success of individual species in three well-known ecosystems can, at least in part, be attributed to the ecosystem interactions in which they are involved. Does the current rate of “natural” (anthropogenic?) selection exceed that which we traditionally consider evolution capable of keeping pace?

Recommended citation: Lagerstrom, K. M., Vance, S., Cornwell, B. H., Ruffley, M., Bellagio, T., Exposito-Alonso, M., Palumbi, S.R., and Hadly, E. A. 2022. From coral reefs to Joshua trees: What ecological interactions teach us about the adaptive capacity of biodiversity in the Anthropocene. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 377(1857): 20210389. http://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.0389
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