Life-history traits of Drosophila melanogaster populations exhibiting early and late eclosion chronotypes. Issue 1 (December 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Nikhil, K.; Ratna, Karatgi; Sharma, Vijay
• Is Part Of: BMC evolutionary biology. Volume 16:Issue 1(2016)
• Page Start: 1
• Page End: 14
• Publication Date: 2016-12
• Subjects: Circadian -- Adaptive significance -- Fitness -- Laboratory selection -- Life-history evolution; Evolution (Biology) -- Periodicals; 576.805
• DOI: 10.1186/s12862-016-0622-3
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1471-2148

Abstract

Abstract Background The hypothesis that circadian clocks confer adaptive advantage to organisms has been proposed based on its ubiquity across almost all levels of complexity and organization of life-forms. This thought has received considerable attention, and studies employing diverse strategies have attempted to investigate it. However, only a handful of them have examined how selection for circadian clock controlled rhythmic behaviors influences life-history traits which are known to influence Darwinian fitness. The 'early' and 'late' chronotypes are amongst the most widely studied circadian phenotypes; however, life-history traits associated with these chronotypes, and their consequences on Darwinian fitness remain largely unexplored, primarily due to the lack of a suitable model system. Here we studied several life-history traits ofDrosophila melanogaster populations that were subjected to laboratory selection for morning (early ) and evening (late ) emergence. Results We report that thelate eclosion chronotypes evolved longer pre-adult duration as compared to theearly eclosion chronotypes both under light/dark (LD) and constant dark (DD) conditions, and these differences appear to be mediated by both clock dependent and independent mechanisms. Furthermore, longer pre-adult duration in thelate chronotypes does not lead to higher body-mass at pupariation or eclosion, but thelate females were significantly more fecund and lived significantly shorter as compared to theearly females. Conclusions Coevolution of multiple life-history traits in response to selection on timing of eclosion highlights correlations of the genetic architecture governing timing of eclosion with that of fitness components which suggests that timing ecologically relevant behaviors at specific time of the day might confer adaptive advantage.