Climate Warming

I’ve had a career-long interest in thermal biology, and have recently become interested in the evolutionary and ecological effects of climate warming. My first paper was done in collaboration with colleagues from the University of Barcelona and the College of William and Mary. We took advantage of the fact that frequencies of many chromosomal inversions of Drosophila subobscura change with latitude and thus with climate temperature. We (Balanya et al., 2006) analyzed old and new samples of chromosomal inversions from many sites in Europe, North America, and South America (samples about 25 years apart, on average), and showed that frequencies of inversions that are typically common in warm climates have increased significantly. Thus global genetic change is tracking global warming.

I’m currently involved with colleagues here at the University of Washington, UCLA, Barnard College, the University of Puerto Rico, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and the University of Oklahoma on analyses of the geographic patterns of the ecological impact of climate warming on various taxa (mainly insects and lizards). We are focusing on Puerto Rico, where several of us worked on the ecology of lizards in the early 1970s. We hope to do quite a bit of work in this area in the near future, looking a long-term chances in body temperatures, operative temperatures, and reproduction.

Huey Papers on Climate Warming

2009. Why tropical forest lizards are vulnerable to climate warming. Proceedings of the Royal Society, B. 276:1939-1948. First author, with J. J. Tewksbury, C. A. Deutsch, L. J. Vitt, P. E. Hertz, and H. J. Alvarez Perez.
2009. Commentary: Can behavior douse the fire of climate warming? Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. First author, with J.J. Tewksbury
2008. Impacts of climate warming on terrestrial ectotherms across latitude. Third author, with C. A. Deutsch, J. J. Tewksbury, K. S. Sheldon, C. K. Ghalambor, D. C. Haak, and P. R. Martin. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 105:6668-6672.
2008. Potential responses to climate change for organisms with complex life histories: evolution and plasticity in Pacific salmon. Evolutionary Applications 1:252-270. (Eighth author, with L. G. Crozier, A.P. Hendry, P.W. Lawson, T.P. Quinn, N.J. Mantua, J. Battin, and R.G. Shaw).
2008. Putting the heat on tropical animals. Science 320:1296-1297. (Second author, with J.J. Tewksbury and C.A. Deutsch).
2008.Commentary: climate warming and environmental sex determination in tuatara: the Last of the Sphenodontians. Proceedings of the Royal Society, B 275:2181-2183. (First author, with F. J. Janzen).
2007. Response to Comment on "Global Genetic Change Tracks Global Climate Warming in Drosophila subobscura". Science 315:1497b. (third author with J. Balanyá, J. M. Oller, G. W. Gilchrist, and L. Serra.)
2006. Global genetic change tracks global climate warming in Drosophila subobscura. Science 313:1773-1775. (third author with J. Balany?, J. M. Oller, G. W. Gilchrist, and L. Serra.)

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