Phenotypic outcomes of predator–prey coevolution are predicted by landscape variation in climate and community composition

Abstract

One of the major goals of evolutionary ecology is to describe the ecological factors that influence species interactions and coevolution (Thompson, 1994). Spatiotemporal variation in climate and community diversity can have dramatic impacts on community structure by directly facilitating the conditions that determine where and when species can interact (Barton & Ives, 2014;Jamieson et al., 2012). These ecological factors can also strengthen the evolutionary mechanisms that translate species interactions into broader

Coevolution with toxic prey produces functional trade-offs in sodium channels of predatory snakes

“…Lastly, we examine how these structural mutations alter the interaction energy dynamics of functional residues in the sodium channel, offering insight into the molecular mechanism of this phenotypic trade-off. The evidence of this trade-off is reproducible across two independently evolved resistant snake species with unique resistance alleles and may underlie the heterogeneous landscape-level distribution of toxin resistance 16,20,46,47 . We conclude that performance trade-offs at the molecular level are the proximate source of higher-order limitations that give rise to constraints on natural selection, and in so doing, comprise a straightforward map from gene sequence to evolutionary consequence.…”

“…and predatory garter snakes (Thamnophis spp.). Newts employ tetrodotoxin (TTX) as an anti-predator defense [10][11][12] , yet some populations of garter snakes have evolved resistance to this potent neurotoxin [13][14][15][16] . Resistance is conferred by mutations directly to the TTX-binding site on voltage-gated sodium channels (proteins: Na V ; genes: SCNnA) 13,[17][18][19][20][21] .…”