Ecological changes with minor effect initiate evolution to delayed regime shifts
P. Catalina Chaparro-Pedraza and André M. de Roos, 2010.
Regime shifts have been documented in a variety of natural and social
systems. These abrupt transitions produce dramatic shifts in the
composition and functioning of socioecological systems. Existing theory
on ecosystem resilience has only considered regime shifts to be caused
by changes in external conditions beyond a tipping point and therefore
lacks an evolutionary perspective. In this study, we show how a change
in external conditions has little ecological effect and does not push
the system beyond a tipping point. The change therefore does not cause
an immediate regime shift but instead triggers an evolutionary process
that drives a phenotypic trait beyond a tipping point, thereby resulting
(after a substantial delay) in a selection-induced regime shift. Our
finding draws attention to the fact that regime shifts observed in the
present may result from changes in the distant past, and highlights the
need for integrating evolutionary dynamics into the theoretical
foundation for ecosystem resilience.
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