Altitudinal variation in organ mass from three mountain systems: The case of mesquite lizard Sceloporus grammicus.
Comp Biochem Physiol A Mol Integr Physiol
; 281: 111426, 2023 07.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-37059292
ABSTRACT
High altitude environments provide a fertile ground for investigating the benefits of phenotypic adjustments at several levels of biological organization. Low oxygen partial pressure and low environmental temperature are the main limiting factors that promote phenotypic variation in different organs, such as the lung and heart. Although high-altitude environments act like natural laboratories, most morphological studies conducted to date lack replication. Here, we evaluated organ mass variation in nine populations of Sceloporus grammicus, throughout three altitudinal gradients (mountains) from the Trans-Mexican volcanic belt. A total of 84 individuals from three different altitudes at three different mountains were collected. Then, we used generalized linear models to analyze the pattern of variation in internal organs mass as a function of altitude and temperature. We observed a striking pattern of altitudinal variation in the size of cardiorespiratory organs while heart mass increased with altitude and decreased with temperature, the lung showed a significant statistical interaction between mountain transect and temperature. Overall, our results support the hypothesis that cardiorespiratory organs should be bigger in populations occurring at higher altitudes. Moreover, the study of different mountain systems allowed us to observe some differences in one mountain in relation to the other two.
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Texto completo:
1
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Prosopis
/
Lagartos
Tipo de estudio:
Prognostic_studies
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Comp Biochem Physiol A Mol Integr Physiol
Asunto de la revista:
BIOLOGIA MOLECULAR
/
FISIOLOGIA
Año:
2023
Tipo del documento:
Article