Copepod life history evolution under high and low food regimes

Copepods play a critical role in the carbon cycle of the planet – they mediate the sequestration of carbon into the deep ocean, and are the trophic link between phytoplankton and marine foodwebs. Global change stressors that decrease copepod productivity create the potential for catastrophic positive feedback loops. Accordingly, a growing list of studies examine the evolutionary capacity of copepods to adapt to the two primary stressors associated with global change: warmer temperatures and lower pH. But the evolutionary capacity of copepods to adapt to changing food regimes, the third major stressor associated with global change, remains unknown. We used experimental evolution to explore how a 10-fold difference in food availability affects life history evolution in the copepod, Tisbe sp. over two years, and spanning 30+ generations. Different food regimes evoked evolutionary responses across the entire copepod life history: we observed evolution in body size, size-fecundity relationships and offspring investment strategies. Our results suggest that changes to food regimes reshape life histories and that cryptic evolution in traits such as body size is likely. We demonstrate that evolution in response to changes in ocean productivity will alter consumer life histories, and may distort trophic links in marine foodchains. Evolution in response to changing phytoplankton productivity may alter the efficacy of the global carbon pump in ways that have not been anticipated until now.