One fish, two fish, red fish, dead fish: Detecting the genomic footprint of ecological incompatibilities

As we uncover the ubiquity of hybridization in nature, determining how natural selection acts on hybrids has newfound importance for speciation. A study in PLOS Biology uses threespine stickleback to detect a genomic signature of ecological incompatibilities

Patterns of Population Structure and Introgression Among Recently Differentiated \u3ci\u3eDrosophila melanogaster\u3c/i\u3e Populations

Despite a century of genetic analysis, the evolutionary processes that have generated the patterns of exceptional genetic and phenotypic variation in the model organism Drosophila melanogaster remains poorly understood. In particular, how genetic variation is partitioned within its putative ancestral range in Southern Africa remains unresolved. Here, we study patterns of population genetic structure, admixture, and the spatial structuring of candidate incompatibility alleles across a global sample, including 223 new accessions, predominantly from remote regions in Southern Africa. We identify nine major ancestries, six that primarily occur in Africa and one that has not been previously described. We find evidence for both contemporary and historical admixture between ancestries, with admixture rates varying both within and between continents. For example, while previous work has highlighted an admixture zone between broadly defined African and European ancestries in the Caribbean and southeastern USA, we identify West African ancestry as the most likely African contributor. Moreover, loci showing the strongest signal of introgression between West Africa and the Caribbean/southeastern USA include several genes relating to neurological development and male courtship behavior, in line with previous work showing shared mating behaviors between these regions. Finally, while we hypothesized that potential incompatibility loci may contribute to population genetic structure across the range of D. melanogaster; these loci are, on average, not highly differentiated between ancestries. This work contributes to our understanding of the evolutionary history of a key model system, and provides insight into the partitioning of diversity across its range

Toward the integration of speciation research

Acknowledgements: We thank the staff of the Tvärminne Zoological Station (University of Helsinki) for their hospitality during the workshop. We are also grateful to everyone who applied to attend the workshop.Funder: European Society for Evolutionary Biology; DOI: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100013632Abstract Speciation research—the scientific field focused on understanding the origin and diversity of species—has a long and complex history. While relevant to one another, the specific goals and activities of speciation researchers are highly diverse, and scattered across a collection of different perspectives. Thus, our understanding of speciation will benefit from efforts to bridge scientific findings and the diverse people who do the work. In this paper, we outline two ways of integrating speciation research: (i) scientific integration, through the bringing together of ideas, data, and approaches; and (ii) social integration, by creating ways for a diversity of researchers to participate in the scientific process. We then discuss five challenges to integration: (i) the multidisciplinary nature of speciation research, (ii) the complex language of speciation; (iii) a bias toward certain study systems; (iv) the challenges of working across scales; and (v) inconsistent measures and reporting standards. We provide practical steps that individuals and groups can take to help overcome these challenges, and argue that integration is a team effort in which we all have a role to play.</jats:p

Toward the integration of speciation research

International audienceSpeciation research—the scientific field focused on understanding the origin and diversity of species—has a long and complex history. While relevant to one another, the specific goals and activities of speciation researchers are highly diverse, and scattered across a collection of different perspectives. Thus, our understanding of speciation will benefit from efforts to bridge scientific findings and the diverse people who do the work. In this paper, we outline two ways of integrating speciation research: (i) scientific integration, through the bringing together of ideas, data, and approaches; and (ii) social integration, by creating ways for a diversity of researchers to participate in the scientific process. We then discuss five challenges to integration: (i) the multidisciplinary nature of speciation research, (ii) the complex language of speciation; (iii) a bias toward certain study systems; (iv) the challenges of working across scales; and (v) inconsistent measures and reporting standards. We provide practical steps that individuals and groups can take to help overcome these challenges and argue that integration is a team effort in which we all have a role to play

Toward the integration of speciation research

Acknowledgements: We thank the staff of the Tvärminne Zoological Station (University of Helsinki) for their hospitality during the workshop. We are also grateful to everyone who applied to attend the workshop.Funder: European Society for Evolutionary Biology; DOI: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100013632Speciation research—the scientific field focused on understanding the origin and diversity of species—has a long and complex history. While relevant to one another, the specific goals and activities of speciation researchers are highly diverse, and scattered across a collection of different perspectives. Thus, our understanding of speciation will benefit from efforts to bridge scientific findings and the diverse people who do the work. In this paper, we outline two ways of integrating speciation research: (i) scientific integration, through the bringing together of ideas, data, and approaches; and (ii) social integration, by creating ways for a diversity of researchers to participate in the scientific process. We then discuss five challenges to integration: (i) the multidisciplinary nature of speciation research, (ii) the complex language of speciation; (iii) a bias toward certain study systems; (iv) the challenges of working across scales; and (v) inconsistent measures and reporting standards. We provide practical steps that individuals and groups can take to help overcome these challenges, and argue that integration is a team effort in which we all have a role to play

Toward the integration of speciation research

Acknowledgements: We thank the staff of the Tvärminne Zoological Station (University of Helsinki) for their hospitality during the workshop. We are also grateful to everyone who applied to attend the workshop.Funder: European Society for Evolutionary Biology; DOI: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100013632Speciation research—the scientific field focused on understanding the origin and diversity of species—has a long and complex history. While relevant to one another, the specific goals and activities of speciation researchers are highly diverse, and scattered across a collection of different perspectives. Thus, our understanding of speciation will benefit from efforts to bridge scientific findings and the diverse people who do the work. In this paper, we outline two ways of integrating speciation research: (i) scientific integration, through the bringing together of ideas, data, and approaches; and (ii) social integration, by creating ways for a diversity of researchers to participate in the scientific process. We then discuss five challenges to integration: (i) the multidisciplinary nature of speciation research, (ii) the complex language of speciation; (iii) a bias toward certain study systems; (iv) the challenges of working across scales; and (v) inconsistent measures and reporting standards. We provide practical steps that individuals and groups can take to help overcome these challenges, and argue that integration is a team effort in which we all have a role to play