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Genome‐wide population genetic analysis identifies evolutionary forces establishing continuous population divergence
Author(s) -
Takahashi Yuma
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
ecological research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.628
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1440-1703
pISSN - 0912-3814
DOI - 10.1007/s11284-017-1459-y
Subject(s) - balancing selection , biology , evolutionary biology , natural selection , selection (genetic algorithm) , frequency dependent selection , population , locus (genetics) , allele frequency , evolutionary dynamics , genetic variation , divergence (linguistics) , stabilizing selection , population genetics , directional selection , genetics , allele , gene , linguistics , philosophy , demography , artificial intelligence , sociology , computer science
Elucidating the mechanism shaping the spatial variations of traits has long been a central concern of evolutionary biologists. Geographic clines of allele/morph frequencies along environmental gradients are suggested to be established and maintained by the balancing of two opposing evolutionary forces, namely selection that generates spatial differentiation in morph frequencies, and selection and/or stochastic factors that lead to the coexistence of multiple morphs within a population. Thus, testing for both selection and stochastic factors is necessary for a comprehensive understanding of the mechanism underlying clinal variation in morph/allele frequency in natural populations. Here, I identified the evolutionary forces responsible for clinal variation of color morph frequency in Ischnura senegalensis by comparing the population divergence of putatively neutral loci generated by high‐throughput next‐generation sequencing ( F STn ) with that of the putative color locus ( F STc ). No strong correlation was observed between F STn and F STc , suggesting that stochastic factors contribute less to color‐locus population divergence. F STc was less than F STn between populations exposed to similar environmental conditions, but greater than F STn between populations exposed to different environmental conditions, suggesting that both balancing selection and divergent selection act on the color locus. Therefore, two antagonistic selection factors rather than stochastic and historical factors contribute to establishing the clinal variation of morph frequency in I. senegalensis .