Extreme thermal fluctuations from climate change unexpectedly accelerate demographic collapse of vertebrates with temperature-dependent sex determination

Global climate is warming rapidly, threatening vertebrates with temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD) by disrupting sex ratios and other traits. Less understood are the effects of increased thermal fluctuations predicted to accompany climate change. Greater fluctuations could accelerate feminization of species that produce females under warmer conditions (further endangering TSD animals), or counter it (reducing extinction risk). Here we use novel experiments exposing eggs of Painted Turtles (Chrysemys picta) to replicated profiles recorded in field nests plus mathematically-modified profiles of similar shape but wider oscillations, and develop a new mathematical model for analysis. We show that broadening fluctuations around naturally male-producing (cooler) profiles feminizes developing embryos, whereas embryos from warmer profiles remain female or die. This occurs presumably because wider oscillations around cooler profiles expose embryos to very low temperatures that inhibit development, and to feminizing temperatures where most embryogenesis accrues. Likewise, embryos incubated under broader fluctuations around warmer profiles experience mostly feminizing temperatures, some dangerously high (which increase mortality), and fewer colder values that are insufficient to induce male development. Therefore, as thermal fluctuations escalate with global warming, the feminization of TSD turtle populations could accelerate, facilitating extinction by demographic collapse. Aggressive global CO₂ mitigation scenarios (RCP2.6) could prevent these risks, while intermediate actions (RCP4.5 and RCP6.0 scenarios) yield moderate feminization, highlighting the peril that insufficient reductions of greenhouse gas emissions pose for TSD taxa. If our findings are generalizable, TSD squamates, tuatara, and crocodilians that produce males at warmer temperatures could suffer accelerated masculinization, underscoring the broad taxonomic threats of climate change.

Thermal Response of Epigenetic Genes Informs Turtle Sex Determination with and without Sex Chromosomes

Vertebrate sexual fate can be established by environmental cues (e.g., temperature-dependent sex determination, TSD) or by genetic content (genotypic sex determination, GSD). While methylation is implicated in TSD, the influence of broader epigenetic processes in sexual development remains obscure. Here, we investigated for the first time the embryonic gonadal expression of the genome-wide epigenetic machinery in turtles, including genes and noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) involved in DNA/histone acetylation, methylation, ubiquitination, phosphorylation, and RNAi. This machinery was active and differentially thermosensitive in TSD versus GSD (ZZ/ZW) turtles. Methylation and histone acetylation genes responded the strongest. The results suggest these working hypotheses: (i) TSD might be mediated by epigenetically controlled hormonal pathways (via acetylation, methylation, and ncRNAs), or by (ii) hormonally controlled epigenetic processes, and (iii) key epigenetic events prior to the canonical thermosensitive period may explain differences between TSD and GSD. Novel epigenetic candidate regulators other than methylation were identified, including previously unknown ncRNAs that could potentially mediate gonadogenesis. These findings illuminate the molecular ecology of reptilian sex determination and permitted hypothesis building to help guide future functional studies on the epigenetic transduction of external cues in TSD versus GSD systems.

Genetic demography at the leading edge of the distribution of a rabies virus vector

The common vampire bat, Desmodus rotundus, ranges from South America into northern Mexico in North America. This sanguivorous species of bat feeds primarily on medium to large-sized mammals and is known to rely on livestock as primary prey. Each year, there are hotspot areas of D. rotundus-specific rabies virus outbreaks that lead to the deaths of livestock and economic losses. Based on incidental captures in our study area, which is an area of high cattle mortality from D. rotundus transmitted rabies, it appears that D. rotundus are being caught regularly in areas and elevations where they previously were thought to be uncommon. Our goal was to investigate demographic processes and genetic diversity at the north eastern edge of the range of D. rotundus in Mexico. We generated control region sequences (441 bp) and 12-locus microsatellite genotypes for 602 individuals of D. rotundus. These data were analyzed using network analyses, Bayesian clustering approaches, and standard population genetic statistical analyses. Our results demonstrate panmixia across our sampling area with low genetic diversity, low population differentiation, loss of intermediate frequency alleles at microsatellite loci, and very low mtDNA haplotype diversity with all haplotypes being very closely related. Our study also revealed strong signals of population expansion. These results follow predictions from the leading-edge model of expanding populations and supports conclusions from another study that climate change may allow this species to find suitable habitat within the U.S. border.

Genetic restoration in the eastern collared lizard under prescribed woodland burning

Eastern collared lizards of the Ozarks live in glades--open, rocky habitats embedded in a woodland matrix. Past fire suppression had made the woodlands a barrier to dispersal, leading to habitat destruction, fragmentation and local extinction. Reintroduced populations of lizards were subjected to 10 years of habitat fragmentation under continued fire suppression followed by twelve years of landscape restoration with prescribed burns. Prior to prescribed burning, genetic diversity decreased within glades and differentiation increased among glades. With woodland burning, genetic diversity within glades first decreased during an expanding colonization phase, but then increased as a dynamically stable metapopulation was established. Population differentiation among glades also stabilized in the metapopulation under weak isolation-by-distance. This study is one of the first to examine the genetic changes in a species of conservation concern throughout all the stages of decline and recovery and shows the importance of landscape-level restoration for maintaining the genetic integrity of populations. This study also demonstrates how mark-recapture and genetic data together can yield detailed insight into metapopulation dynamics that would be impossible from just one type of data alone.

The lesser known challenge of climate change: thermal variance and sex-reversal in vertebrates with temperature-dependent sex determination

Climate change is expected to disrupt biological systems. Particularly susceptible are species with temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD), as in many reptiles. While the potentially devastating effect of rising mean temperatures on sex ratios in TSD species is appreciated, the consequences of increased thermal variance predicted to accompany climate change remain obscure. Surprisingly, no study has tested if the effect of thermal variance around high-temperatures (which are particularly relevant given climate change predictions) has the same or opposite effects as around lower temperatures. Here we show that sex ratios of the painted turtle (Chrysemys picta) were reversed as fluctuations increased around low and high unisexual mean-temperatures. Unexpectedly, the developmental and sexual responses around female-producing temperatures were decoupled in a more complex manner than around male-producing values. Our novel observations are not fully explained by existing ecological models of development and sex determination, and provide strong evidence that thermal fluctuations are critical for shaping the biological outcomes of climate change.

Invited Minireview: Restoring Demographic Processes in Translocated Populations: The Case of Collared Lizards in the Missouri Ozarks Using Prescribed Forest Fires

Habitat fragmentation is one of the more important contributors to species endangerment, but one form of fragmentation, here called dispersal fragmentation, can often go unobserved for many years after it has occurred. Many species live in naturally fragmented habitats, but the local populations are interconnected genetically and demographically by dispersal through the environmental matrix in which the habitats are embedded. Because of dispersal, the local populations are not truly fragmented evolutionarily or ecologically. However, when human activities alter the environmental matrix such that dispersal is no longer possible, the population does indeed become fragmented even though they initially are present in the same habitats. An example of dispersal fragmentation via an altered environmental matrix is provided by the eastern collared lizard (Crotaphytus collaris collaris). This lizard lives on open, rocky habitats, called glades, that are embedded in the forests of the Ozarks, a highland region located primarily in Missouri and Arkansas in the USA. Forest fire suppression has reduced this habitat, resulting in severe habitat fragmentation, disruption of gene flow, loss of genetic variation within glade populations, and local extinction without recolonization. Beginning in 1982, glade habitats were restored by clearing and burning in the Peck Ranch area of the Missouri Ozarks, a region where the lizards had gone extinct. Starting in 1984, lizard populations were translocated from other Missouri glades onto restored glades at the Peck Ranch. Although these translocated populations survived well on the restored glades, no movement was detected between glades, some just 50 m apart, and no colonization of nearby restored glades, some just 60 m away, occurred between 1984 and 1993. Fragmentation, lack of colonization, no gene flow, and loss of genetic variation still persisted despite translocation reversing some of the local extinction. Fire scar data from trees and tree stumps indicated that forest fires were common in this area prior to European settlement, so in 1994 a new management policy of prescribed burning of both the glades and their forest matrix was initiated. Once the forest had been burned, the lizards could disperse kilometers through the forest, thereby reestablishing the processes of dispersal, gene flow, colonization, and local extinction followed by recolonization. This resulted in a dramatic increase in population size and inhabited area. By incorporating a landscape perspective into the management strategy, the eastern collared lizard has been successfully reestablished in a region of historic extirpation.