Plant Adaptation in a Changing Climate: From Molecular Mechanisms to Ecosystem Resilience

Rapid climate change is altering temperature regimes, precipitation patterns, seasonality and the frequency of climatic extremes faster than many plant populations have historically experienced. Persistence can arise from several processes that operate on different timescales: phenotypic plasticity can modify performance within generations, local adaptation can supply spatially structured genetic variation, and contemporary evolution can shift traits and allele frequencies across generations. Evolutionary rescue is a more demanding outcome because adaptation must occur rapidly enough to reverse climate-driven demographic decline before extinction. This critical narrative review integrates these processes rather than treating them as independent alternatives. Literature published from 1 January 2000 to 15 July 2026 was evaluated, with emphasis on reciprocal transplants, common gardens, resurrection studies, experimental evolution, quantitative genetics, genomic forecasting and eco-evolutionary demographic analyses. The evidence indicates that plasticity commonly provides the earliest buffer against environmental change, but its fitness value is trait-, population- and environment-dependent and can become insufficient or maladaptive in novel conditions. Local adaptation is widespread, yet the same climatic specialisation that confers current fitness can generate future maladaptation as climate–genotype matching deteriorates. Rapid adaptive evolution is well demonstrated in several annual plants and increasingly detectable at genomic scale, but evidence for full evolutionary rescue remains comparatively scarce. Long generation time, small declining populations, limited connectivity, genetic correlations, biotic interactions and climate novelty can prevent adaptive change from translating into demographic persistence. Genomic offset and assisted gene flow are promising management tools, but predictive performance remains context dependent and requires independent field validation. Plant persistence under rapid climate change is therefore best understood as an eco-evolutionary race in which plasticity, standing variation, gene flow, selection and demography interact. Forecasts should measure not only whether plants can evolve, but whether evolution occurs quickly enough, in the right traits, and with sufficient demographic benefit to avert population loss.