Food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability
Abstract
Organisms exhibit reversible physiological adjustments as a response to rapidly changing environments. Yet, such plasticity of the phenotype is gradual and may lag behind the environmental fluctuations, thereby affecting the long-term average performance of the organisms. By supplying energy and essential compounds for optimal tissue building, food determines the range of possible phenotypic changes and potentially the rate at which they occur. Here, we assess how differences in the dietary supply of essential lipids modulate the phenotypic plasticity of an ectotherm facing thermal fluctuations. We use three phytoplankton strains to create a gradient of polyunsaturated fatty acids and sterols supply for Daphnia magna under constant and fluctuating temperatures. We used three different fluctuation periodicities to unravel the temporal dynamics of gradual plasticity and its long-term consequences on D. magna performance measured as juvenile somatic growth rate. In agreement with gradual plasticity theory, we show that in D. magna, fluctuation periodicity determines the differential between observed growth rates and those expected from constant conditions. Most importantly, we show that diet modulates both the size and the direction of the growth rate differential. Overall, we demonstrate that the nutritional context is essential for predicting ectotherm consumers’ performance in fluctuating thermal environments.
README: Supplementary Data_Food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability
Journal: Ecology
Authors: Marine Van Baelen, Alexandre Bec, Erik Sperfeld, Nathan Frizot and Apostolos-Manuel Koussoroplis
Date of data collection: 2020-2023
Geographic location of the data collection : LMGE, Universite Clermont Auvergne, France
Summary and contextualized in experimental procedures and results
Here, you have accesss to all data and code used i the article "Food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability".
We use three phytoplankton strains to create a gradient of polyunsaturated fatty acids and sterols supply for Daphnia magna under constant and fluctuating temperatures. We used three different fluctuation periodicities to unravel the temporal dynamics of gradual plasticity and its long-term consequences on D. magna performance measured as juvenile somatic growth rate. In agreement with gradual plasticity theory, we show that in D. magna, fluctuation periodicity determines the differential between observed growth rates and those expected from constant conditions. Most importantly, we show that diet modulates both the size and the direction of the growth rate differential.
To obtain the different data, we ran two experiments:
First, Daphnia magna individuals were fed on three different diets and incubated in climate chambers with temperature alternating between 20°C and 28°C with 3 different periodicities (every 12 hrs, 24hrs or 48hrs) while trying to keep the same mean temperature and variance across treatments.
Then, in order to have a reference for performance without temperature fluctuations and to model the Thermal Performance Curve (TPC), we additionally grew Daphnia at constant temperatures of 18°C, 20°C, 24°C, 26°C, 28°C and 30°C, fed on the three diets.
We measured the growth rate at day 6 of individuals for each experiment and condition.
The data were collected in an Excell file/Table file and analysed with an R script.
Sharing/Access information
Licenses/restrictions placed on the data: CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain
Links to publications that cite or use the data:
Van Baelen M., A. Bec, E. Sperfeld, N. Frizot and A.M. Koussoroplis, food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability, Ecology (2023)
Links to other publicly accessible locations of the data: None
Links/relationship to ancillary data sets: None
Was data derived from another source? No
If yes, list source(s): NA
Recommended citation for this dataset:
Van Baelen, Marine et al. (Forthcoming 2023). Food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability [Dataset]. Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.hmgqnk9n5
DATA & FILE OVERVIEW
- File List:
I-Data.ZIP file
A) F12.txt
B) F24.txt
C) F48.txt
D) growth_rate_constant.txt
E) growth_rate-fluctuation.txt
F) mean_growth_rate_fluctuation
II-Script.ZIP file
A) model_comparison.R
B) script.R
C) script_fig2.R
D) script_fig3.R
E) models file
a) Script_beta_equation.R
b) Script_boatman_equation.R
c) Script_briere2_equation.R
d) Script_gaussian_equation.R
e) Script_lactin2_equation.R
f) Script_pawar_equation.R
g) Script_quadratic_equation.R
h) Script_shaperschoolhigh_equation.R
g) Script_thomas1_equation.R
h) Script_weibull_equation.R
- Relationship between files, if important: None
- Additional related data collected that was not included in the current data package: None
- Are there multiple versions of the dataset? No A. If yes, name of file(s) that was updated: NA i. Why was the file updated? NA ii. When was the file updated? NA
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DATA-SPECIFIC INFORMATION FOR: F12.txt / F24.txt / F48.txt
These datasets were used to create Figure 2.
- Number of variables: 4
- Number of cases/rows: 8640
- Variable List:
- Min: number of minutes
- Time: date and precise hour
- Temp: temperature
- hours: minutes converted in hours
################################
DATA-SPECIFIC INFORMATION FOR: growth_rate_constant.txt
This dataset was used to create Figure 2 and 3.
- Number of variables: 6
- Number of cases/rows: 157
- Variable List:
- temperature: temperature treatment
- temp: temperature treatment in character
- treatment: diet treatment ( Y= Cryptomonas sp; C =Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and S= Synechococcus sp)
- day: day at which the organism is measured
- M: mass in mg
- time: hours at which the organism is measured
################################
DATA-SPECIFIC INFORMATION FOR: growth_rate_fluctuation.txt
This dataset was used to create Figure 2 and 3.
- Number of variables: 7
- Number of cases/rows: 237
- Variable List:
- Treatment: temperature treatment (cst =constant temperature, F12= temperature fluctuation every 12hours, F24= temperature fluctuation every 24hours, F48= temperature fluctuation every 48hours)
- Type: diet treatment ( Y= Cryptomonas sp; C =Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and S= Synechococcus sp)
- treatment: diet treatment ( Y= Cryptomonas sp; C =Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and S= Synechococcus sp)
- time: hours at which the organism is measured
- gh: growth rate per hours
- g: growth rate per day
- F: hours until temperature shift
- M: mass in ug
################################
DATA-SPECIFIC INFORMATION FOR: mean_growth_rate_fluctuation.txt
This dataset was used to create Figure 3.
- Number of variables: 7
- Number of cases/rows: 10
- Variable List:
- Treat: temperature and diet treatment (F12= temperature fluctuation every 12hours, F24= temperature fluctuation every 24hours, F48= temperature fluctuation every 48hours and Y= Cryptomonas sp; C =Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and S= Synechococcus sp)
- type: temperature treatment (F12= temperature fluctuation every 12hours, F24= temperature fluctuation every 24hours, F48= temperature fluctuation every 48hours)
- treatment: diet treatment ( Y= Cryptomonas sp; C =Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and S= Synechococcus sp)
- g: mean growth rate per day
- lower: lower deviation
- upper: upper deviation
- temp: mean temperature of the fluctuation treatment
Description of the Script file : code and software
- Script.R is used to summarize the data processing and figure/table results in the manuscript "Food quality shapes gradual phenotypic plasticity in ectotherms facing temperature variability."
- Script_fig2.R and Script_fig3.R are used to create the Figure 2 and 3.
- model_comparison.R is used to create the figure and the model comparison in the Appendix S1: Figure 1 (TPC model choice) with the diffrent equations in the "models" file: "Script_Weibull_equation," "Script_gaussian_equation,"...corresponding to the appendix S1: Figure 2.
All Script files are only available on R software. All the necessary packages are included in the script.
Methods
To obtain the different data, we ran two experiments:
First, Daphnia magna individuals were fed on three different diets and incubated in climate chambers (POL-EKO ST3/3C SMART) with temperature alternating between 20°C and 28°C with 3 different periodicities (every 12 hrs, 24hrs or 48hrs) while trying to keep the same mean temperature and variance across treatments.
Then, in order to have a reference for performance without temperature fluctuations and to model the Thermal Performance Curve (TPC), we additionally grew Daphnia at constant temperatures of 18°C, 20°C, 24°C, 26°C, 28°C and 30°C, fed on the three diets.
We measured for each experiment and condition, the growth rate at day 6 of individuals,
The data were collected in an Excell file and analysed with an R script.
Usage notes
R software is required to open the script included with these data files; all the data can be opened with Excel or TableNote.