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Updated: Jan 4, 2026

Stable Isotope In-Vivo Labeling for Mass-Spectrometry Identification of Paternal Metabolites Transferred from Sperm to Oocyte During Fertilization
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Transgenerational Plasticity in Human-Altered Environments.

Sarah C Donelan1, Jennifer K Hellmann2, Alison M Bell2

  • 1Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, 647 Contees Wharf Road, Edgewater, MD 21037, USA.

Trends in Ecology & Evolution
|November 11, 2019
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Transgenerational plasticity (TGP) helps species adapt across generations. However, rapid environmental change can disrupt TGP, potentially leading to negative fitness outcomes for species.

Keywords:
HIRECclimate changehuman-induced rapid environmental changematernal effectsparental effectsphenotypic plasticity

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Area of Science:

  • Evolutionary biology
  • Ecology
  • Environmental science

Background:

  • Transgenerational plasticity (TGP) is a mechanism where parental environments influence offspring phenotypes.
  • TGP is adaptive when parental and offspring environments are predictable and correlated.
  • Human-induced rapid environmental change (HIREC) challenges the conditions favoring TGP.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To examine how HIREC impacts the reliability and adaptive potential of TGP.
  • To predict the fitness consequences of TGP under novel environmental conditions.

Main Methods:

  • Conceptual analysis of TGP mechanisms in the context of HIREC.
  • Review of ecological and evolutionary principles governing phenotypic plasticity.

Main Results:

  • HIREC can disrupt parental cue detection and the parent-offspring environmental correlation.
  • Disrupted TGP signaling can lead to maladaptive responses and reduced fitness.
  • While generally detrimental, TGP may occasionally yield beneficial outcomes in HIREC.

Conclusions:

  • Understanding TGP is crucial for predicting species' responses to HIREC.
  • HIREC poses significant challenges to the adaptive function of TGP.
  • The fitness consequences of TGP under HIREC are likely negative but context-dependent.