A multifunction trade-off has contrasting effects on the evolution of form and function

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine A Corn ◽  
Christopher M Martinez ◽  
Edward D Burress ◽  
Peter C Wainwright
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Dynamics ◽  
Functional Diversification ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Kinematic Evolution ◽  
Rates Of Evolution ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Feeding Mechanics ◽  
And Function ◽  
Suction Performance ◽  
Clear Support

Abstract Trade-offs caused by the use of an anatomical apparatus for more than one function are thought to be an important constraint on evolution. However, whether multifunctionality suppresses diversification of biomechanical systems is challenged by recent literature showing that traits more closely tied to trade-offs evolve more rapidly. We contrast the evolutionary dynamics of feeding mechanics and morphology between fishes that exclusively capture prey with suction and multifunctional species that augment this mechanism with biting behaviors to remove attached benthic prey. Diversification of feeding kinematic traits was, on average, over 13.5 times faster in suction feeders, consistent with constraint on biters due to mechanical trade-offs between biting and suction performance. Surprisingly, we found that the evolution of morphology contrasts directly with these differences in kinematic evolution, with significantly faster rates of evolution of head shape in biters. This system provides clear support for an often postulated, but rarely confirmed prediction that multifunctionality stifles functional diversification, while also illustrating the sometimes weak relationship between form and function.

Native Advertising in Online News: Trade-Offs Among Clicks, Brand Recognition, and Website Trustworthiness

2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anocha Aribarg ◽  
Eric M. Schwartz
Keyword(s):  
Field Experiments ◽  
Online Advertising ◽  
Online News ◽  
Editorial Content ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Brand Recognition ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Conflicting Objectives ◽  
And Function ◽  
Click Through Rate

Native advertising is a type of online advertising that matches the form and function of the platform on which it appears. In practice, the choice between display and in-feed native advertising presents brand advertisers and online news publishers with conflicting objectives. Advertisers face a trade-off between ad clicks and brand recognition, whereas publishers need to strike a balance between ad clicks and the platform’s trustworthiness. For policy makers, concerns that native advertising confuses customers prompted the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to issue guidelines for disclosing native ads. This research aims to understand how consumers respond to native ads versus display ads and to different styles of native ad disclosures, using randomized online and field experiments combining behavioral clickstream, eye movement, and survey response data. The results show that when the position of an ad on a news page is controlled for, a native ad generates a higher click-through rate because it better resembles the surrounding editorial content. However, a display ad leads to more visual attention, brand recognition, and trustworthiness for the website than a native ad.

scholarly journals Trade-offs among plant reproductive traits determine interactions with floral visitors

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jose B. Lanuza ◽  
Romina Rader ◽  
Jamie Stavert ◽  
Liam K. Kendall ◽  
Manu E. Saunders ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Reproductive Traits ◽  
Life History Strategies ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Plant Life ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Floral Visitors ◽  
Plant Form ◽  
And Function ◽  
Plant Pollinator

Plant life-history strategies are constrained by cost-benefit trade-offs that determine plant form and function. However, despite recent advances in the understanding of trade-offs for vegetative and physiological traits, little is known about plant reproductive economics and how they constrain plant life-history strategies and shape interactions with floral visitors. Here, we investigate plant reproductive trade-offs and how these drive interactions with floral visitors using a dataset of 17 reproductive traits for 1,506 plant species from 28 plant-pollinator studies across 18 countries. We tested whether a plant's reproductive strategy predicts its interactions with floral visitors and if the different reproductive traits predict the plant's role within the pollination network. We found that over half of all plant reproductive trait variation was explained by two independent axes that encompassed plant form and function. Specifically, the first axis indicated the presence of a trade-off between flower number and flower size, while the second axis indicated a pollinator dependency trade-off. Plant reproductive trade-offs helped explain partly the presence or absence of interactions with floral visitors, but not differences in visitation rate. However, we did find important differences in the interaction level among floral visitor guilds on the different axes of trait variation. Finally, we found that plant size and floral rewards were the most important traits in the understanding of the plant species network role. Our results highlight the importance of plant reproductive trade-offs in determining plant life-history strategies and plant-pollinator interactions in a global context.

scholarly journals On the evolution of baboon greeting rituals

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federica Dal Pesco ◽  
Julia Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Comprehensive Analysis ◽  
Contest Competition ◽  
Animal Kingdom ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
And Function ◽  
Aggressive Signals

To balance the trade-offs of male co-residence, males living in multi-male groups may exchange ritualized greetings. Although these non-aggressive signals are widespread in the animal kingdom, the repertoire described in the genus Papio is exceptional, involving potentially harmful behaviours such as genital fondling. Such greetings are among the most striking male baboon social interactions, yet their function remains disputed. Drawing on the comprehensive analysis from our own research on wild Guinea baboons, combined with a survey of the literature into other baboon species, we review the form and function of male-male ritualized greetings and their relation to the various social systems present in this genus. These ritualized signals differ between species in their occurrence, form, and function. While ritualized greetings are rare in species with the most intense contest competition, the complexity of and risk involved in greeting rituals increase with the degree of male-male tolerance and cooperation. The variety of societies found in this genus, combined with its role as a model for human socioecological evolution, sheds light on the evolution of ritualized behaviour in non-human primates and rituals in humans.

scholarly journals The Limits to Adaptation in Restored Ecosystems and How Management Can Help Overcome Them

2019 ◽  
Vol 104 (3) ◽  
pp. 441-454 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Lau ◽  
Susan M. Magnoli ◽  
Chad R. Zirbel ◽  
Lars A. Brudvig
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Variation ◽  
Prescribed Fire ◽  
Site Selection ◽  
Small Population ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Interacting Species ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
The Face ◽  
Restored Prairie ◽  
And Function

Adaptation drives the diversity of form and function observed in nature and is key to population persistence. Yet, adaptation can be limited by a lack of genetic variation, trade-offs, small population size, and constraints imposed by coevolving interacting species. These limits may be particularly important to the colonizing populations in restored ecosystems, such as native prairies restored through seed sowing. Here, we discuss how constraints to adaptation are likely to play out in restored prairie ecosystems and how management decisions, such as seed mix composition, prescribed fire, and strategic site selection, might be used to overcome some of these constraints. Although data are still limited, recent work suggests that restored prairie populations likely face strong selection and that promoting the potential for adaptation in these systems may be necessary for restoring populations both now and in the face of further global change.

scholarly journals Why Darwin would have loved evolutionary game theory

2016 ◽  
Vol 283 (1838) ◽  
pp. 20160847 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel S. Brown
Keyword(s):  
Game Theory ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Evolutionary Game Theory ◽  
Evolutionary Dynamics ◽  
Evolutionary Game ◽  
Scientific Basis ◽  
Matrix Games ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Heritable Phenotype ◽  
And Function

Humans have marvelled at the fit of form and function, the way organisms' traits seem remarkably suited to their lifestyles and ecologies. While natural selection provides the scientific basis for the fit of form and function, Darwin found certain adaptations vexing or particularly intriguing: sex ratios, sexual selection and altruism. The logic behind these adaptations resides in frequency-dependent selection where the value of a given heritable phenotype (i.e. strategy) to an individual depends upon the strategies of others. Game theory is a branch of mathematics that is uniquely suited to solving such puzzles. While game theoretic thinking enters into Darwin's arguments and those of evolutionists through much of the twentieth century, the tools of evolutionary game theory were not available to Darwin or most evolutionists until the 1970s, and its full scope has only unfolded in the last three decades. As a consequence, game theory is applied and appreciated rather spottily. Game theory not only applies to matrix games and social games, it also applies to speciation, macroevolution and perhaps even to cancer. I assert that life and natural selection are a game, and that game theory is the appropriate logic for framing and understanding adaptations. Its scope can include behaviours within species, state-dependent strategies (such as male, female and so much more), speciation and coevolution, and expands beyond microevolution to macroevolution. Game theory clarifies aspects of ecological and evolutionary stability in ways useful to understanding eco-evolutionary dynamics, niche construction and ecosystem engineering. In short, I would like to think that Darwin would have found game theory uniquely useful for his theory of natural selection. Let us see why this is so.

scholarly journals The relationship between head shape, head musculature and bite force in caecilians (Amphibia: Gymnophiona)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aurélien Lowie ◽  
Barbara De Kegel ◽  
Mark Wilkinson ◽  
John Measey ◽  
James C. O'Reilly ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bite Force ◽  
Temporal Region ◽  
Head Shape ◽  
Skull Shape ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Feeding Mechanics ◽  
Mandible Shape ◽  
And Function ◽  
The Relationship

Caecilians are enigmatic limbless amphibians that, with a few exceptions all have an at least partly burrowing lifestyle. Although it has been suggested that caecilian evolution resulted in sturdy and compact skulls as an adaptation to their head-first burrowing habits, no relationship between skull shape and burrowing performance has been demonstrated to date. However, the unique dual jaw-closing mechanism and the osteological variability of their temporal region suggest a potential relationship between skull shape and feeding mechanics. Here, we explored the relationships between skull shape, head musculature, and in vivo bite forces. Although there is a correlation between bite force and external head shape, no relationship between bite force and skull shape could be detected. Whereas our data suggest that muscles are the principal drivers of variation in bite force, the shape of the skull is constrained by factors other than demands for bite force generation. However, a strong covariation between the cranium and mandible exists. Moreover, both cranium and mandible shape covary with jaw muscle architecture. Caecilians show a gradient between species with a long retroarticular process associated with a large and pennate-fibered m. interhyoideus posterior and species with a short process but long and parallel-fibered jaw adductors. Our results demonstrate the complexity of the relationship between form and function of this jaw system. Further studies that focus on factors such as gape distance or jaw velocity will be needed in order to fully understand the evolution of feeding mechanics in caecilians.

scholarly journals Complex macroevolutionary dynamics underly the evolution of the crocodyliform skull

2021 ◽  
Vol 288 (1954) ◽  
pp. 20210919
Author(s):  
Ryan N. Felice ◽  
Diego Pol ◽  
Anjali Goswami
Keyword(s):  
Phenotypic Variation ◽  
Rapid Evolution ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Force Production ◽  
Skull Morphology ◽  
Crown Group ◽  
Limited Region ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Rates Of Evolution ◽  
And Function

All modern crocodyliforms (alligators, crocodiles and the gharial) are semi-aquatic generalist carnivores that are relatively similar in cranial form and function. However, this homogeneity represents just a fraction of the variation that once existed in the clade, which includes extinct herbivorous and marine forms with divergent skull structure and function. Here, we use high-dimensional three-dimensional geometric morphometrics to quantify whole-skull morphology across modern and fossil crocodyliforms to untangle the factors that shaped the macroevolutionary history and relatively low phenotypic variation of this clade through time. Evolutionary modelling demonstrates that the pace of crocodyliform cranial evolution is initially high, particularly in the extinct Notosuchia, but slows near the base of Neosuchia, with a late burst of rapid evolution in crown-group crocodiles. Surprisingly, modern crocodiles, especially Australian, southeast Asian, Indo-Pacific species, have high rates of evolution, despite exhibiting low variation. Thus, extant lineages are not in evolutionary stasis but rather have rapidly fluctuated within a limited region of morphospace, resulting in significant convergence. The structures related to jaw closing and bite force production (e.g. pterygoid flange and quadrate) are highly variable, reinforcing the importance of function in driving phenotypic variation. Together, these findings illustrate that the apparent conservativeness of crocodyliform skulls betrays unappreciated complexity in their macroevolutionary dynamics.

Global trade-offs in tree functional traits

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel S. Maynard ◽  
Lalasia Bialic-Murphy ◽  
Constantin M. Zohner ◽  
Colin Averill ◽  
Johan van den Hoogen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Functional Traits ◽  
Seed Mass ◽  
Tree Height ◽  
Woody Species ◽  
Tree Size ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Plant Trait ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Structure Tree ◽  
And Function

AbstractDue to massive energetic investments in woody support structures, trees are subject to unique physiological, mechanical, and ecological pressures not experienced by herbaceous plants. When considering trait relationships across the entire plant kingdom, plant trait frameworks typically must omit traits unique to large woody species, thereby limiting our understanding of how these distinct ecological pressures shape trait relationships in trees. Here, by considering 18 functional traits—reflecting leaf economics, wood structure, tree size, reproduction, and below-ground allocation—we quantify the major axes of variation governing trait expression of trees worldwide. We show that trait variation within and across angiosperms and gymnosperms is captured by two independent processes: one reflecting tree size and competition for light, the other reflecting leaf photosynthetic capacity and nutrient economies. By exploring multidimensional relationships across clusters of traits, we further identify a representative set of seven traits which captures the majority of variation in form and function in trees: maximum tree height, stem conduit diameter, specific leaf area, seed mass, bark thickness, root depth, and wood density. Collectively, this work informs future trait-based research into the functional biogeography of trees, and contributes to our fundamental understanding of the ecological and evolutionary controls on forest biodiversity and productivity worldwide.

scholarly journals Mechanical sensitivity reveals evolutionary dynamics of mechanical systems

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1804) ◽  
pp. 20143088 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. S. L. Anderson ◽  
S. N. Patek
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Biology ◽  
Evolutionary Dynamics ◽  
Morphological Changes ◽  
Morphological Diversity ◽  
Mechanical Sensitivity ◽  
Minimal Impact ◽  
Form And Function ◽  
Form Function ◽  
And Function ◽  
Four Bar Linkage

A classic question in evolutionary biology is how form–function relationships promote or limit diversification. Mechanical metrics, such as kinematic transmission (KT) in linkage systems, are useful tools for examining the evolution of form and function in a comparative context. The convergence of disparate systems on equivalent metric values (mechanical equivalence) has been highlighted as a source of potential morphological diversity under the assumption that morphology can evolve with minimal impact on function. However, this assumption does not account for mechanical sensitivity—the sensitivity of the metric to morphological changes in individual components of a structure. We examined the diversification of a four-bar linkage system in mantis shrimp (Stomatopoda), and found evidence for both mechanical equivalence and differential mechanical sensitivity. KT exhibited variable correlations with individual linkage components, highlighting the components that influence KT evolution, and the components that are free to evolve independently from KT and thereby contribute to the observed pattern of mechanical equivalence. Determining the mechanical sensitivity in a system leads to a deeper understanding of both functional convergence and morphological diversification. This study illustrates the importance of multi-level analyses in delineating the factors that limit and promote diversification in form–function systems.

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