Study
Impacts of climate warming on terrestrial ectotherms across latitude
Deutsch, Curtis A.; Tewksbury, Joshua J.; Huey, Raymond B.; Sheldon, Kimberly S.; Ghalambor, Cameron K.; Haak, David C.; Martin, Paul R.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2008
Combined measured thermal performance curves for insects across latitudes with projected warming, calculating for each species how far its current environment sits from its thermal optimum.
- Studied in
- Insecta
- Sample size
- 38 insect species with measured thermal performance curves
Tropical species live closest to their thermal optima and have the narrowest safety margins, so modest warming reduces their performance while temperate species, living well below their optima, may initially benefit.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Thermal risk is greatest where warming is smallest, because the margin between current conditions and physiological limits is what matters rather than the size of the change.
How NatureHQ reads it
A second counter-intuitive result to set alongside Stillman’s, and the same lesson: what predicts risk is headroom, not toughness and not the amount of warming. The tropics warm least and are most exposed.
- A modelling study built on performance curves measured in the laboratory, which do not capture behavioural avoidance in the field.
- Insects only, and the species with measured curves are not a random sample.
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesPublished in PNAS.
doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0709472105
Checked against Crossref on 2026-09-28, and they agree on the title, the authors and the year.
NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-09-03.