Evolutionary constraints on adaptive evolution during range expansion in an invasive plant.

Evolution in invasive plants: implications for biological control.

Evidence is increasing that invasive plants can undergo rapid adaptive evolution during the process of range expansion. Here, we argue that evolutionary change during invasions will also affect plant-antagonist interactions and, thus, will have important implications for biological control programmes targeted at invasive plants. We explore how altered selection in the new range might influence ...

Rapid adaptation to climate facilitates range expansion of an invasive plant.

Adaptation to climate, evolving over contemporary time scales, could facilitate rapid range expansion across environmental gradients. Here, we examine local adaptation along a climatic gradient in the North American invasive plant Lythrum salicaria. We show that the evolution of earlier flowering is adaptive at the northern invasion front where it increases fitness as much as, or more than, the...

All stressed out and nowhere to go: does evolvability limit adaptation in invasive species? An introduction to the symposium at the SSE/ASN/SSB meeting, June 2004.

Introduced and invasive species are major threats native species and communities and, quite naturally, most scientists and managers think of them in terms of ecological problems. However, species introductions are also experiments in evolution, both for the alien species and for the community that they colonize. We focus here on the introduced species because these offer opportunities to study ...

Adaptive divergence at the margin of an invaded range.

Invasive plant species threaten biological communities globally. However, relatively little is known about how evolutionary processes vary over the course of an invasion. To evaluate the importance of historical and adaptive drivers of range expansion, we compare the performance of North American populations of invasive Lonicera japonica from areas established 100-150 years ago, now the souther...

Developing Adaptive Differential Evolution as a New Evolutionary Algorithm, Application in Optimization of Chemical Processes