Study
The physiology of climate change: how potentials for acclimatization and genetic adaptation will determine “winners” and “losers”
Somero, George N.
Journal of Experimental Biology, 2010
Reviews physiological work on thermal limits in marine animals, separating acclimatisation — reversible remodelling within an individual — from genetic adaptation across generations, and asks which of the two a warming ocean will actually call on.
- Studied in
- Animalia
- Sample size
- review across marine taxa
Acclimatisation capacity and adaptive capacity are different quantities, they are not correlated across species, and a species can have a wide tolerance range while having almost no ability to shift it.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Predicting which species cope with warming requires knowing both how much an individual can adjust and how much a population can evolve; measuring only one of them systematically misleads.
How NatureHQ reads it
The record that makes the adaptation/acclimatisation distinction consequential rather than a matter of vocabulary. It is cited wherever NatureHQ refuses the sentence “the animal adapted”, because on this evidence the two things it might mean predict opposite outcomes.
- A review: it synthesises rather than measures, and the marine emphasis means terrestrial and freshwater generalisation is weaker.
- Written before much of the experimental-evolution work that has since tested some of its predictions directly.
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Adaptation
An individual animal cannot adapt. It can acclimatise — remodel itself over days or weeks, reversibly. Adaptation is a change in a population across generations, and no individual undergoes it.
Heat tolerance
The most heat-tolerant species are often the most at risk from warming, not the least. Tolerance and the ability to raise tolerance further are inversely related, so the toughest animals have the least headroom left.
Published by: The Company of BiologistsPublished by The Company of Biologists.
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.