scholarly journals Quantifying the individual impact of artificial barriers in freshwaters: A standardized and absolute genetic index of fragmentation

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jérôme G. Prunier ◽  
Camille Poesy ◽  
Vincent Dubut ◽  
Charlotte Veyssière ◽  
Géraldine Loot ◽  
...  

AbstractFragmentation by artificial barriers is an important threat to freshwater biodiversity. Mitigating the negative aftermaths of fragmentation is of crucial importance, and it is now essential for environmental managers to benefit from a precise estimate of the individual impact of weirs and dams on river connectivity. Although the indirect monitoring of fragmentation using molecular data constitutes a promising approach, it is plagued with several constraints preventing a standardized and individual quantification of barrier effects. Indeed, observed levels of genetic differentiation depend on both the age of the obstacle and the effective size of the populations it separates, making difficult comparisons of the actual barrier effect of different obstacles. Here, we developed a standardized genetic index of fragmentation (FINDEX), allowing an absolute and independent assessment of the individual effects of obstacles on connectivity. The FINDEX is the standardized ratio (expressed as a percentage) between the observed genetic differentiation between pairs of populations located on either side of an obstacle and the genetic differentiation expected if this obstacle completely prevented gene flow. The expected genetic differentiation is calculated from simulations taking into account two nuisance parameters: the number of generations since barrier creation (the age of the obstacle) and the expected heterozygosity of the targeted populations, a proxy for effective population sizes. Using both simulated and published empirical datasets, we explored and discussed the validity and the limits of the FINDEX. We demonstrated that it allows quantifying genetic effects of fragmentation only from a few generations after barrier creation and provides valid comparisons among populations (or species) of different effective populations sizes and obstacles of different ages. The computation of the FINDEX requires a minimum amount of fieldwork and genotypic data, and solves some of the difficulties inherent to the study of artificial fragmentation in rivers and potentially in other ecosystems. This makes the FINDEX a promising and objective tool for managers aiming at at planning restoration programs and at evaluating the efficiency of these programs.

1989 ◽  
Vol 67 (9) ◽  
pp. 2294-2300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Risa H. Rosenberg

I assessed the genetic differentiation of populations of Weidemeyer's admiral butterfly (Limenitis weidemeyerii) in central and eastern Colorado by using starch-gel electrophoresis. Wright's F-statistics indicated that there was significant differentiation, both within and between years, among the same populations analyzed for 2 successive years, and among populations, even those in close geographic proximity. Consequently, no correlation was found between the genetic identities and geographic distances between pairs of populations. To explain the genetic structure of populations, I estimated patterns of movement and effective sizes of populations. I assessed movement of individuals by using mark–recapture techniques, which indicated that travel over the season for both sexes was negligible (range 0–2850 m, mean 166 m). I estimated effective population sizes by using Pollak's methods, and as would be expected for populations with territorial social systems, effective sizes were small (ranging from 17 to 131, mean 61). These two factors, small and isolated populations, suggest that a significant portion of the genetic differentiation observed at allozyme loci among populations of Weidemeyer's admiral butterfly in Colorado is mediated by random genetic drift.


2021 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Reiner ◽  
C. Klein ◽  
M. Lang ◽  
H. Willems

AbstractNineteen red deer areas in a densely populated region with a huge network of fenced motorways and the division into administrative management units (AMUs) with restricted ecological connectivity were investigated. In the season 2018/2019, a total of 1291 red deer samples (on average 68 per area) were collected and genotyped using 16 microsatellite markers. The results show a clear genetic differentiation between most of the AMUs. Fourteen AMUs may be combined into four regions with a considerable internal genetic exchange. Five areas were largely isolated or showed only a limited gene flow with neighbouring areas. Ten of the 19 AMUs had an effective population size below 100. Effective population sizes greater than 500–1000, required to maintain the evolutionary potential and a long-term adaptation potential, were not achieved by any of the studied AMUs, even when AMUs with an appreciable genetic exchange were aggregated. Substantial genetic differentiation between areas can be associated with the presence of landscape barriers hindering gene flow, but also with the maintenance of ‘red deer–free’ areas. Efforts to sustainably preserve the genetic diversity of the entire region should therefore focus on measures ensuring genetic connectivity. Opportunities for this goal arise from the establishment of game bridges over motorways and from the protection of young male stags migrating through the statutory ‘red deer–free’ areas.


2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jérôme G. Prunier ◽  
Vincent Dubut ◽  
Lounès Chikhi ◽  
Simon Blanchet

SummaryPairwise measures of neutral genetic differentiation are supposed to contain information about past and on-going dispersal events and are thus often used as dependent variables in correlative analyses to elucidate how neutral genetic variation is affected by landscape connectivity. However, spatial heterogeneity in the intensity of genetic drift, stemming from variations in population sizes, may inflate variance in measures of genetic differentiation and lead to erroneous or incomplete interpretations in terms of connectivity. Here, we tested the efficiency of two distance-based metrics designed to capture the unique influence of spatial heterogeneity in local drift on genetic differentiation. These metrics are easily computed from estimates of effective population sizes or from environmental proxies for local carrying capacities, and allow us to introduce the hypothesis of Spatial-Heterogeneity-in-Effective-Population-Sizes (SHNe). SHNe can be tested in a way similar to isolation-by-distance or isolation-by-resistance within the classical landscape genetics hypothesis-testing framework.We used simulations under various models of population structure to investigate the reliability of these metrics to quantify the unique contribution of SHNe in explaining patterns of genetic differentiation. We then applied these metrics to an empirical genetic dataset obtained for a freshwater fish (Gobio occitaniae).Simulations showed that SHNe explained up to 60% of variance in genetic differentiation (measured as Fst) in the absence of gene flow, and up to 20% when migration rates were as high as 0.10. Furthermore, one of the two metrics was particularly robust to uncertainty in the estimation of effective population sizes (or proxies for carrying capacity). In the empirical dataset, the effect of SHNe on spatial patterns of Fst was five times higher than that of isolation-by-distance, uniquely contributing to 41% of variance in pairwise Fst. Taking the influence of SHNe into account also allowed decreasing the signal-to-noise ratio, and improving the upper estimate of effective dispersal distance.We conclude that the use of SHNe metrics in landscape genetics will substantially improve the understanding of evolutionary drivers of genetic variation, providing substantial information as to the actual drivers of patterns of genetic differentiation in addition to traditional measures of Euclidean distance or landscape resistance.


Genetics ◽  
1973 ◽  
Vol 73 (3) ◽  
pp. 513-530
Author(s):  
J P Hanrahan ◽  
E J Eisen ◽  
J E Legates

ABSTRACT The effects of population size and selection intensity on the mean response was examined after 14 generations of within full-sib family selection for postweaning gain in mice. Population sizes of 1, 2, 4, 8 and 16 pair matings were each evaluated at selection intensities of 100% (control), 50% and 25% in a replicated experiment. Selection response per generation increased as selection intensity increased. Selection response and realized heritability tended to increase with increasing population size. Replicate variability in realized heritability was large at population sizes of 1, 2 and 4 pairs. Genetic drift was implicated as the primary factor causing the reduced response and lowered repeatability at the smaller population sizes. Lines with intended effective population sizes of 62 yielded larger selection responses per unit selection differential than lines with effective population sizes of 30 or less.


2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (Supplement_6) ◽  
pp. vi123-vi124
Author(s):  
Sybren Maas ◽  
Damian Stichel ◽  
Thomas Hielscher ◽  
Philipp Sievers ◽  
Anna Berghoff ◽  
...  

Abstract PURPOSE Meningiomas are the most frequent primary intracranial tumors. Patient outcome varies widely from cases with benign to highly aggressive, ultimately fatal courses. Reliable identification of risk of progression for the individual patient is of pivotal importance in clinical management. However, only biomarkers for highly aggressive tumors are established at present (CDKN2A/B and TERT), while no molecularly-based stratification exists for the broad spectrum of low- and intermediate-risk meningioma patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS DNA methylation data and copy-number information were generated for 3,031 meningiomas of 2,868 individual patients, with mutation data for 858 samples. DNA methylation subgroups, copy-number variations (CNV), mutations and WHO grading were comparatively analyzed. Prediction power for outcome of these parameters was assessed in an initial retrospective cohort of 514 patients, and validated on a retrospective cohort of 184, and on a prospective cohort of 287 multi-center cases, respectively. RESULTS Both CNV and methylation family- (MF)-based subgrouping independently resulted in an increase in prediction accuracy of risk of recurrence compared to the WHO classification (c-indexes WHO 2016, CNV, and MF 0.699, 0.706 and 0.721, respectively). Merging all independently powerful risk stratification approaches into an integrated molecular-morphological score resulted in a further, substantial increase in accuracy (c-index 0.744). This integrated score consistently provided superior accuracy in all three cohorts, significantly outperforming WHO grading (c-index difference p=0.005). Besides the overall stratification advantage, the integrated score separates more precisely for risk of progression at the diagnostically challenging interface of WHO grade 1 and grade 2 tumors (HR 4.56 [2.97;7.00], 4.34 [2.48;7.57] and 3.34 [1.28; 8.72] for discovery, retrospective, and prospective validation cohort, respectively). CONCLUSIONS Merging these layers of histological and molecular data into an integrated, three-tiered score significantly improves the precision in meningioma stratification. Implementation into diagnostic routine informs clinical decision-making for meningioma patients on the basis of robust outcome prediction.


2001 ◽  
Vol 77 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-166 ◽  
Author(s):  
BRIAN CHARLESWORTH

Formulae for the effective population sizes of autosomal, X-linked, Y-linked and maternally transmitted loci in age-structured populations are developed. The approximations used here predict both asymptotic rates of increase in probabilities of identity, and equilibrium levels of neutral nucleotide site diversity under the infinite-sites model. The applications of the results to the interpretation of data on DNA sequence variation in Drosophila, plant, and human populations are discussed. It is concluded that sex differences in demographic parameters such as adult mortality rates generally have small effects on the relative effective population sizes of loci with different modes of inheritance, whereas differences between the sexes in variance in reproductive success can have major effects, either increasing or reducing the effective population size for X-linked loci relative to autosomal or Y-linked loci. These effects need to be accounted for when trying to understand data on patterns of sequence variation for genes with different transmission modes.


1994 ◽  
Vol 346 (1317) ◽  
pp. 333-343 ◽  

High mutation rates are generally considered to be detrimental to the fitness of multicellular organisms because mutations untune finely tuned biological machinery. However, high mutation rates may be favoured by a need to evade an immune system that has been strongly stimulated to recognize those variants that reproduced earlier during the infection, hiv infections conform to this situation because they are characterized by large numbers of viruses that are continually breaking latency and large numbers that are actively replicating throughout a long period of infection. To be transmitted, HIVS are thus generally exposed to an immune system that has been activated to destroy them in response to prior viral replication in the individual. Increases in sexual contact should contribute to this predicament by favouring evolution toward relatively high rates of replication early during infection. Because rapid replication and high mutation rate probably contribute to rapid progression of infections to aids, the interplay of sexual activity, replication rate, and mutation rate helps explain why HIV-1 has only recently caused a lethal pandemic, even though molecular data suggest that it may have been present in humans for more than a century. This interplay also offers an explanation for geographic differences in progression to cancer found among infections due to the other major group of human retroviruses, human T-cell lymphotropic viruses (HTLV). Finally, it suggests ways in which we can use natural selection as a tool to control the aids pandemic and prevent similar pandemics from arising in the future.


2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Waldman ◽  
S. Elizabeth Alter ◽  
Douglas Peterson ◽  
Lorraine Maceda ◽  
Nirmal Roy ◽  
...  

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