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Abstract(s)
Background The negative impacts of climate change on biodiversity are consistently increasing. Developmen‑
tal stages are particularly sensitive in many ectotherms. Moreover, sex-specifc diferences in how organisms cope with thermal stress can produce biased sex ratios upon emergence, with potentially major impacts on population persistence. This is an issue that needs investigation, particularly testing whether thermal selection can alleviate sex ratio distortions in the long-term is a critical but neglected issue. Here, we report an experiment analyzing the sex ratio patterns at diferent developmental temperatures in Drosophila subobscura populations subjected to long-term experimental evolution (~30 generations) under a warming environment.
Results We show that exposure to high developmental temperatures consistently promotes sex ratio imbalance
upon emergence, with a higher number of female than male ofspring. Furthermore, we found that thermal selec‑
tion resulting from evolution in a warming environment did not alleviate such sex ratio distortions generated by heat stress.
Conclusions We demonstrate that heat stress during development can lead to clear sex ratio deviations upon emergence likely because of diferential survival between sexes. In face of these fndings, it is likely that sex ratio deviations of this sort occur in natural populations when facing environmental perturbation. The inability of many insects to avoid thermal shifts during their (more) sessile developmental stages makes this finding particularly troublesome for population subsistence in face of climate warming events.
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BMC