Evolutionary biology consists in the study of the evolutionary processes responsible of the diversification and adaptation of life forms over time. When adapting to a new environment (or changes in their local environment), populations have to adapt through natural selection. Until recently, the study of adaptation was focusing on fathoming the consequences of natural selection at the phenotypic level and how phenotypic evolution is linked to genetic changes. The development of new genetic and genomic tools in the last 20 years, like high-throughput sequencing technologies, now allows the construction of reference genomes in a variety of non-model organisms and the investigation of the genomic basis of adaptation. In my thesis, I investigated the genomic basis of adaptation by exploring the consequences of natural selection at the molecular level using the threespine stickleback fish (Gasterosteus acualeatus) as a model.
In more detail, my work focused on three main topics: the genomic basis of parallel adaptation to acidic versus basic lochs of North Uist (Outer Hebrides, Scotland); the maintenance of standing genetic variation in Atlantic stickleback fish, and the characterization of reproductive isolation at the genomic level between parapatric stickleback populations of the Misty watershed (Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada)
