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Admixture is a driver rather than a passenger in experimental invasions
Author(s) -
Hufbauer Ruth A.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of animal ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.134
H-Index - 157
eISSN - 1365-2656
pISSN - 0021-8790
DOI - 10.1111/1365-2656.12600
Subject(s) - range (aeronautics) , biology , ecology , callosobruchus maculatus , callosobruchus chinensis , heterosis , population , selection (genetic algorithm) , genetic diversity , habitat , evolutionary biology , pest analysis , botany , demography , sociology , materials science , hybrid , artificial intelligence , computer science , composite material
Genetic admixture propels invasions of Callosobruchus maculatus across experimental landscapes. In Focus: Wagner, N.K., Ochocki, B.M., Crawford, K.M., Compagnoni, A. & Miller, T.E.X. (2017) Genetic mixture of multiple source populations accelerates invasive range expansion. Journal of Animal Ecology , 86 , 21–34. In this issue of Journal of Animal Ecology , Wagner et al . (2017) demonstrate that genetic diversity can alter the course of spread of biological invasions. They employ Callosobruchus seed beetles in a clever array of linked habitat patches to compare experimental invasions using individuals from single population sources or from mixes of two, four or six population sources. By taking a model‐selection approach, they find that any amount of mixture propels growth rates and spread of introduced populations. This suggests that heterosis alone can alter the course of an invasive range expansion.