Browsing by Author "Lillo, Francesco"

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    Global realized niche divergence in the African clawed frog Xenopus laevis
    (John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 2017) Rodder, Dennis; Ihlow, Flora; Courant, Julien; Secondi, Jean; Herrel, Anthony; Rebelo, Rui; Measey, G. J.; Lillo, Francesco; De Villiers, F. A.; De Busschere, Charlotte; Backeljau, Thierry
    Although of crucial importance for invasion biology and impact assessments of climate change, it remains widely unknown how species cope with and adapt to environmental conditions beyond their currently realized climatic niches (i.e., those climatic conditions existing populations are exposed to). The African clawed frog Xenopus laevis, native to southern Africa, has established numerous invasive populations on multiple continents making it a pertinent model organism to study environmental niche dynamics. In this study, we assess whether the realized niches of the invasive populations in Europe, South, and North America represent subsets of the species’ realized niche in its native distributional range or if niche shifts are traceable. If shifts are traceable, we ask whether the realized niches of invasive populations still contain signatures of the niche of source populations what could indicate local adaptations. Univariate comparisons among bioclimatic conditions at native and invaded ranges revealed the invasive populations to be nested within the variable range of the native population. However, at the same time, invasive populations are well differentiated in multidimensional niche space as quantified via n-dimensional hypervolumes. The most deviant invasive population are those from Europe. Our results suggest varying degrees of realized niche shifts, which are mainly driven by temperature related variables. The crosswise projection of the hypervolumes that were trained in invaded ranges revealed the south-western Cape region as likely area of origin for all invasive populations, which is largely congruent with DNA sequence data and suggests a gradual exploration of novel climate space in invasive populations.
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    Impacts of climate change on the global invasion potential of the African clawed frog xenopus laevis
    (Public Library of Science, 2016-06-01) Ihlow, Flora; Courant, Julien; Secondi, Jean; Herrel, Anthony; Rebelo, Rui; Measey, G. John; Lillo, Francesco; De Villiers, F. Andre; Vogt, Solveig; De Busschere, Charlotte; Backeljau, Thierry; Rodder, Dennis
    By altering or eliminating delicate ecological relationships, non-indigenous species are considered a major threat to biodiversity, as well as a driver of environmental change. Global climate change affects ecosystems and ecological communities, leading to changes in the phenology, geographic ranges, or population abundance of several species. Thus, predicting the impacts of global climate change on the current and future distribution of invasive species is an important subject in macroecological studies. The African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis), native to South Africa, possesses a strong invasion potential and populations have become established in numerous countries across four continents. The global invasion potential of X. laevis was assessed using correlative species distribution models (SDMs). SDMs were computed based on a comprehensive set of occurrence records covering South Africa, North America, South America and Europe and a set of nine environmental predictors. Models were built using both a maximum entropy model and an ensemble approach integrating eight algorithms. The future occurrence probabilities for X. laevis were subsequently computed using bioclimatic variables for 2070 following four different IPCC scenarios. Despite minor differences between the statistical approaches, both SDMs predict the future potential distribution of X. laevis, on a global scale, to decrease across all climate change scenarios. On a continental scale, both SDMs predict decreasing potential distributions in the species’ native range in South Africa, as well as in the invaded areas in North and South America, and in Australia where the species has not been introduced. In contrast, both SDMs predict the potential range size to expand in Europe. Our results suggest that all probability classes will be equally affected by climate change. New regional conditions may promote new invasions or the spread of established invasive populations, especially in France and Great Britain.