NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2019: The evolution of mate-choice traits and genomic architecture of speciation in swallows \(genus Hirundo\)

本行动资助NSF 2019年度生物学博士后研究奖学金，利用生物馆藏进行研究。该奖学金支持研究和培训将以创新的方式利用生物收集的研究员。描述生物多样性（地球上生命的多样性）是进化生物学的中心目标。这项研究旨在了解生物体基因组的变化是如何创造新物种的。该研究员将利用自然史收集的数据和基因组数据来了解燕子是如何形成新物种的。为了促进更广泛的科学参与，该研究员还将指导来自主办实验室机构中代表性不足群体的学生，并与当地企业一起组织外联和娱乐活动，以促进科学家与更广泛的社区之间的接触。基因组资源的积累使我们对生殖隔离的基因组基础的理解取得了最新进展，并导致了一种假设，即赋予基因流动障碍的位点之间的非随机关联可能是物种形成的强大驱动因素。然而，这种屏障位点的“耦合”需要进一步的实证证明，以确认其在物种形成中的重要性。本研究将通过综合分析从自然历史标本中收集的表型数据和从燕子属代表中新生成的基因组数据来解决这一需求。由于Hirundo包括物种形成连续体的不同阶段的谱系和配偶选择性状的相当大的表型变异，因此它是一个理想的系统，用于测试选择性状下屏障位点耦合驱动物种形成的经验证据。此外，本研究将通过量化遗传多样性、重组景观以及交配选择特征区域的基因组组成和结构来彻底检查物种形成的基因组结构。最终，本研究将整合表型数据分析和比较群体基因组学，以测试不同性状之间耦合在物种形成过程中的重要性。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2019, Research Using Biological Collections. The fellowship supports research and training of the fellow that will utilize biological collections in innovative ways. Characterizing biodiversity (the diversity of life on the planet) is a central goal of evolutionary biology. This research aims to understand how changes in an organism's genome create new species. The Fellow will use data from natural history collections combined with genome data to understand how swallows may have formed new species. To increase broader participation in science, the Fellow will also mentor students from underrepresented groups at the host-lab institution, and organize outreach and entertainment events with local businesses to promote engagement between scientists and the broader community.The accumulation of genomic resources has allowed for recent advances in our understanding of the genomic basis of reproductive isolation and has led to the hypothesis that non-random associations between loci that confer barriers to gene flow may be powerful drivers of speciation. However, further empirical demonstration of this 'coupling' of barrier loci is required to confirm its importance in speciation. This research will address this need through integrative analysis of phenotypic data collected from natural history specimens and newly-generated genomic data from representatives across the swallow genus Hirundo. Because Hirundo includes lineages at various stages of the speciation continuum and considerable phenotypic variation in mate choice traits, it is an ideal system to test for empirical evidence that the coupling of barrier loci underlying selected traits drives speciation. Further, this research will thoroughly examine the genomic architecture of speciation by quantifying genetic diversity, the recombination landscape, and genomic composition and structure in regions underlying mate-choice traits. Ultimately, this study will integrate analyses of phenotypic data and comparative population genomics to test the importance of coupling between divergent traits in the process of speciation.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.