From global change to a butterfly flapping: biophysics and behaviour affect tropical climate change impacts.

ABSTRACT: Difficulty in characterizing the relationship between climatic variability and climate change vulnerability arises when we consider the multiple scales at which this variation occurs, be it temporal (from minute to annual) or spatial (from centimetres to kilometres). We studied populations of a single widely distributed butterfly species, Chlosyne lacinia, to examine the physiological, morphological, thermoregulatory and biophysical underpinnings of adaptation to tropical and temperate climates. Microclimatic and morphological data along with a biophysical model documented the importance of solar radiation in predicting butterfly body temperature. We also integrated the biophysics with a physiologically based insect fitness model to quantify the influence of solar radiation, morphology and

SUBMITTER: Bonebrake TC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4173678 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature