Epigenetics and insect polyphenism: mechanisms and climate change impacts

Abstract

Phenotypic plasticity is a ubiquitous process found in all living organisms. Polyphenism is an extreme case of phenotypic plasticity which shares a common scheme in insects such as honeybees, locusts or aphids: an initial perception of environmental stimuli, a neuroendocrine transmission of these signals to the target tissues, the activation of epigenetic mechanisms allowing the setup of alternative transcriptional programs responsible for the establishment of discrete phenotypes. Climate change can modulate the environmental stimuli triggering polyphenisms, and/or some epigenetics marks, thus modifying on the short and long terms the discrete phenotype proportions within populations. This might result in critical ecosystem changes.