Physiological plasticity in lizard embryos exposed to high-altitude hypoxia

Gerardo A. Cordero*, Bea Angelica Andersson, Jeremie Souchet, Gaëlle Micheli, Daniel W.A. Noble, Eric J. Gangloff, Tobias Uller, Fabien Aubret

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

21 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Coping with novel environments may be facilitated by plastic physiological responses that enable survival during environmentally sensitive life stages. We tested the capacity for embryos of the common wall lizard (Podarcis muralis) from low altitude to cope with low-oxygen partial pressure (hypoxia) in an alpine environment. Developing embryos subjected to hypoxic atmospheric conditions (15–16% O2 sea-level equivalent) at 2,877 m above sea level exhibited responses common to vertebrates acclimatized to or evolutionarily adapted to high altitude: suppressed metabolism, cardiac hypertrophy, and hyperventilation. These responses might have contributed to the unaltered incubation duration and hatching success relative to the ancestral, low-altitude, condition. Even so, hypoxia constrained egg energy utilization such that larger eggs produced hatchlings with relatively low mass. These findings highlight the role of physiological plasticity in maintaining fitness-relevant phenotypes in high-altitude environments, providing impetus to further explore altitudinal limits to ecological diversification in ectothermic vertebrates.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)423-432
Number of pages10
JournalJournal of Experimental Zoology Part A: Ecological and Integrative Physiology
Volume327
Issue number7
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Aug 2017
Externally publishedYes

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