生态位构建的进化意义及其生态与行为响应

生态位构建是指有机体对局部环境中重要组成成分的建造、修复以及选择的一种能力.重点讨论了生态位构建的进化意义以及由生态位构建引起的生态和行为响应,主要结果包括:(1)生态继承作为与基因继承并行的遗传途径,扩展了对有机体适应性的机理解释;(2)环境变化与有机体对该变化导致的选择压的响应之间存在的时滞能够产生进化惯量与动量;(3)生态位构建与生态系统工程之间存在三个层面的差异;(4)Baldwin效应、自然选择和生态位构建分别体现了有机体对环境变化的中性、被动和主动等三种不同响应;(5)由于生态位构建可取决于学习的过程,因此它可以解释动物行为对策的进化.通过对生态位构建中这些热点问题以及其理论研究不足的讨论,提出了该领域中三个潜在的研究方向.

The evolutionary implication of niche construction and its ecological or behavioral responses

Niche construction refers to the capacity of organisms to construct, modify and select important components of their local environments. By niche construction, organisms not only modify both biotic and abiotic sources of natural selection, but also generate a feedback in evolution. In this paper, the evolutionary implications of niche construction are discussed, so are its ecological and behavioral responses. The results include: (1) As the parallel genetic way of gene inheritance, ecological inheritance extends the profound comprehension for species' adaptation; (2) The time lag between the environmental changes and response of organism to the selection can create the evolutionary inertia and evolutionary momentum; (3) Niche construction shows throe differences from ecosystem engineering; (4) Baldwin effect is compared with natural selection and niche construction, which respectively indicate neutral, passive and positive responses of organisms to environments; (5) The niche construction can explain the evolution of behavior strategy because of its dependence on learning. Through discussing these hot topics and the shortage of theoretical research on niche construction, we propose three potential directions in this field.