{"title":"Analysis of resting status reveals distinct elevational variation in metabolisms of lizards","authors":"Zhong-Wen Jiang, Liang Ma, Shi-ang Tao, Cheng Wenda, Chuyu Cheng, Dan-yang Wu, Wei-Guo Du","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4414","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>Animals spend a considerable proportion of their life span at rest. However, resting status has often been overlooked when investigating how species respond to environmental conditions. This may induce a large bias in understanding the local adaptation of species across environmental gradients and their vulnerability to potential environmental change. Here, we conducted an empirical study on montane agamid lizards, combined with mechanistic modeling, to compare elevational variations in body temperature and metabolisms (cumulative digestion and maintenance cost) between resting and active status. Our study on three populations of an agamid lizard along an elevational gradient revealed a trend of decreasing body temperature toward higher elevations, the main contributor of which was resting status of the lizards. Using population-specific reaction norms, we predicted greater elevational variation in hourly and cumulative digestion for resting lizards than for active lizards. Climate-change impacts, estimated as the change in cumulative digestion, also show greater elevational variation when resting status is factored into the analysis. Further, our global analysis of 98 agamid species revealed that in about half of their combined distributional range, the contribution of resting status in determining the elevational variation in cumulative digestion and maintenance cost of lizards was greater than the contribution made by a lizard's active status. Our study highlights the importance of considering resting status when investigating how species respond to environmental conditions, especially for those distributed over tropical and subtropical mountain areas.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.4000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Ecology","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ecy.4414","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ECOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Animals spend a considerable proportion of their life span at rest. However, resting status has often been overlooked when investigating how species respond to environmental conditions. This may induce a large bias in understanding the local adaptation of species across environmental gradients and their vulnerability to potential environmental change. Here, we conducted an empirical study on montane agamid lizards, combined with mechanistic modeling, to compare elevational variations in body temperature and metabolisms (cumulative digestion and maintenance cost) between resting and active status. Our study on three populations of an agamid lizard along an elevational gradient revealed a trend of decreasing body temperature toward higher elevations, the main contributor of which was resting status of the lizards. Using population-specific reaction norms, we predicted greater elevational variation in hourly and cumulative digestion for resting lizards than for active lizards. Climate-change impacts, estimated as the change in cumulative digestion, also show greater elevational variation when resting status is factored into the analysis. Further, our global analysis of 98 agamid species revealed that in about half of their combined distributional range, the contribution of resting status in determining the elevational variation in cumulative digestion and maintenance cost of lizards was greater than the contribution made by a lizard's active status. Our study highlights the importance of considering resting status when investigating how species respond to environmental conditions, especially for those distributed over tropical and subtropical mountain areas.
期刊介绍:
Ecology publishes articles that report on the basic elements of ecological research. Emphasis is placed on concise, clear articles documenting important ecological phenomena. The journal publishes a broad array of research that includes a rapidly expanding envelope of subject matter, techniques, approaches, and concepts: paleoecology through present-day phenomena; evolutionary, population, physiological, community, and ecosystem ecology, as well as biogeochemistry; inclusive of descriptive, comparative, experimental, mathematical, statistical, and interdisciplinary approaches.