Natural selection and the genetics of adaptation in threespine stickleback |
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Authors: | Dolph Schluter Kerry B Marchinko R D H Barrett Sean M Rogers |
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Institution: | 1.Biodiversity Research Centre and Zoology Department, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, V6T 1Z4;2.Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA 98109, USA;3.Department of Biological Sciences, University of Calgary, Calgary Alberta, Canada, T2N OL3 |
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Abstract: | Growing knowledge of the molecular basis of adaptation in wild populations is expanding the study of natural selection. We summarize ongoing efforts to infer three aspects of natural selection—mechanism, form and history—from the genetics of adaptive evolution in threespine stickleback that colonized freshwater after the last ice age. We tested a mechanism of selection for reduced bony armour in freshwater by tracking genotype and allele frequency changes at an underlying major locus (Ectodysplasin) in transplanted stickleback populations. We inferred disruptive selection on genotypes at the same locus in a population polymorphic for bony armour. Finally, we compared the distribution of phenotypic effect sizes of genes underlying changes in body shape with that predicted by models of adaptive peak shifts following colonization of freshwater. Studies of the effects of selection on genes complement efforts to identify the molecular basis of adaptive differences, and improve our understanding of phenotypic evolution. |
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Keywords: | natural selection genetics of adaptation stickleback ectodysplasin |
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