Revisiting evolutionary rescue in the wild

Area of Science:

• Ecology and evolutionary biology
• Conservation biology
• Population genetics

Background:

• Rapid environmental change poses a significant threat to biodiversity.
• Theoretical and experimental work suggests evolution can facilitate population persistence in novel environments.
• Evolutionary rescue (ER) is a key concept for understanding population survival under environmental stress.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a nuanced framework for identifying evolutionary rescue.
• To emphasize the probabilistic role of evolution in reducing extinction risk.
• To examine diverse evolutionary traits, pathways, and population outcomes in wild systems.

Main Methods:

• Reviewing recent examples of evolutionary rescue in natural populations.
• Analyzing multiple lines of evidence to assess ER.
• Identifying factors that facilitate ER, such as reduced environmental stress and maintained genetic diversity.

Main Results:

• Evolutionary rescue involves a range of evolving traits and pathways.
• Population outcomes of ER are diverse.
• Reduced environmental stress, maintained genetic diversity, and protected adaptive alleles facilitate ER.

Conclusions:

• A probabilistic view of evolution is crucial for understanding ER.
• Multiple lines of evidence are needed to identify ER effectively.
• Future research should explore the impact of population-level ER on ecosystem resilience.