Adaptation to spatially heterogeneous modifying and adaptive environments

The development of an individual's phenotype is influenced by environmental factors (the modifying environment) which may differ from those factors (the adaptive environment) that decide on the adaptational value of the developed phenotype. The shapes of adaptationally optimal norms of reaction are therefore essentially determined by associations between these two environmental components together with the degree of adaptational sensitivity of the developed phenotypes. Two complementary aspects of optimality are accounted for: (a) environments can be optimal for a given norm of reaction and (b) norms of reaction can be optimal for a given environment. The results are obtained for random distribution of genotypes over environmental conditions and under the physiologically reasonable premise that fitness is a function of the costs of modification and adaptation. It turned out that the associations of adaptive and modifying environments are the primary sources of adaptational optimization. More specifically, it is shown that (i) independence between the two environmental components constitutes an adaptationally optimal environment only for norms of reaction in which all phenotypes are adaptively insensitive; (ii) if costs of modification do not depend on the environment, and if the two environmental components are not associated, adaptationally optimal norms of reaction can always be realized through phenogenetic invariance; (iii) as a rule, adaptively sensitive phenotypes developed under strong environmental associations necessitate phenogenetic plasticity for the optimal norm of reaction; (iv) a norm of reaction which is adaptationally optimal in its adaptationally optimal environment can always be realized through phenogenetic invariance, if costs of modification do not vary with the environment. These results reveal an important role of patterns of adaptive sensitivity of phenotypes, which may even surpass that of shapes of norms of reaction in adaptational processes.