International Research Fellowship Program: Integrated Genomic Analysis of Neutral and Adaptive Variation in Natural Populations of the Zebrafish

国际研究奖学金计划使美国科学家和工程师能够在国外进行9到24个月的研究。该计划的奖项提供了联合研究的机会，并利用国外独特或互补的设施、专业知识和实验条件。该奖项将支持安德鲁·R·怀特利博士与加拿大拉瓦尔大学的路易斯·伯纳切斯博士合作的为期24个月的研究奖学金。该项目的主要目标是促进对适应性进化的理解，从基因水平到基因表达，再到表型，并在进化史和保护的背景下解释适应模式。PI和东道主将对印度本土斑马鱼(Danio Rerio)如何适应高速和低速水生栖息地进行详细分析。他们将比较来自两个高速热带环境(河流)和两个低速狭长环境(池塘/湖泊)的种群，这些环境位于两个地理上分离的地区内和之间。此外，他们还将结合对游泳成绩重要的基因的等位基因频率的变化、同一组基因的表达水平、游泳生理和形态的分析，以全面分析对水流速度差异的适应性反应，以及在印度各地进行中性分子标记遗传分化的系统地理分析。这种分析将允许根据群体间的进化差异来解释所分析的性状(从基因频率到表型)，并允许他们考虑遗传漂移对这组性状的影响，因为它将提供中性遗传分化的估计。此外，还将使用并行表型进化的测试，即在密切相关的谱系中相同性状的独立进化，以了解自然选择在塑造表型变异中的作用。这种从基因到基因表达再到表型的分析组合是可能的，因为对斑马鱼野生种群的研究可以建立在令人难以置信的详细的发育和分子遗传学知识以及我们已经拥有的针对该物种的大量分子工具的基础上。这项研究有望填补我们对有机体适应性进化的机制基础的理解上的空白。此外，这项研究还将提供有关斑马鱼在印度的进化史的信息，从而初步了解一个国家的鱼类物种保护单位，该国人口密度非常高，其高度多样化的栖息地类型(其中一些被认为是生物多样性热点)的保护问题迫切。

0601864WhiteleyThe International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Andrew R. Whiteley to work with Dr. Louis Bernatchez at University Laval in Canada.The primary goals of this project are to advance understanding of adaptive evolution from the level of the genotype, to gene expression, to phenotype and to interpret adaptive patterns within the context of evolutionary history and conservation. The PI and host will conduct a detailed analysis of how zebrafish (Danio rerio) in their native range in India have adapted to high and low velocity aquatic habitats. They will compare populations from two high velocity lotic environments (rivers) to two low velocity lentic environments (ponds/lakes) within and between two geographically separate regions. Also they will combine analyses of variation in allele frequencies of genes important for swimming performance, expression levels at the same set of genes, swimming physiology, and morphology for a comprehensive analysis of adaptive response to differences in water velocity, as well as conducting a phylogeographic analysis of genetic differentiation at neutral molecular markers across India. This analysis will allow interpretation in the traits analyzed (from gene frequency to phenotype) in terms of evolutionary divergence among populations and allow them to consider the effects of genetic drift on this suite of characters because it will provide an estimate of neutral genetic differentiation. In addition, tests for parallel phenotypic evolution, the independent evolution of the same trait in closely related lineages, to high and low velocity habitats will be used to understand the role of natural selection in shaping phenotypic variation. This combination of analysis from gene, to gene expression, to phenotype is possible because studies of wild populations of zebrafish can build on the incredibly detailed knowledge of development and molecular genetics as well as the enormous array of molecular tools that we already possess for this species. This research promises to fill a void in our understanding of the mechanistic underpinnings of organismal adaptive evolution. Moreover, this research will also provide information on the evolutionary history of zebrafish in India and thus, an initial understanding of the conservation units of a fish species in a country with very high human population densities and pressing conservation concerns in its highly varied habitat types (some of which are considered biodiversity hot spots).