Collaborative Research: RAPID: Genomic and phenotypic responses to hurricane-mediated selection in an invasive lizard: does epistasis constrain evolution?

该项目将研究极端天气事件的进化反应，并增加我们对遗传学如何影响人口对选择的反应的理解。我们知道飓风等极端天气事件会对野生种群产生长期的进化影响。然而，目前还没有关于基因组因素如何促进或阻碍这种进化的信息。该项目将重点关注棕色变色龙（Anolis sagrei），这是一种在佛罗里达广泛分布的入侵蜥蜴，原产于古巴。它将比较2018年采样的种群与飓风伊恩之后的相同种群。对日益强烈和频繁的灾难性天气的进化反应（或缺乏）的信息将是我们理解野生种群对全球变化的反应的关键组成部分。该项目还将培训研究生和本科生的实地方法，以及形态和基因组和数据分析。先前的工作包括高质量的基因组，栖息地利用和棕色anoles的形态数据。采样覆盖了沿着佛罗里达和南格鲁吉亚的纬度范围分布的30个种群。在先前研究的指导下，假设选择的强度与风速相关，因此更强的风将有利于更长的肢体。此外，肢长选择的进化反应将受到一个大效应肢长位点和棕色变色龙种群基因组背景之间的相互作用的强烈影响。具体来说，将有一个较弱的进化反应，飓风介导的选择肢体长度在人口广泛的混合祖先。以前的研究发现，上位性之间的相互作用，否则肢体长度和基因组背景的杂交种群的大效应位点。由于这些基因组背景在佛罗里达各不相同，这些影响应该在地理上有所不同。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

This project will study evolutionary responses to extreme weather events and increase our understanding of how genetics influences a population’s response to selection. We know that extreme weather events such as hurricanes can have long-lasting, evolutionary effects on wild populations. However, no information exists about how genomic factors that might facilitate or impede that evolution.The project will focus on brown anoles (Anolis sagrei), a widespread invasive lizard in Florida that is native to Cuba. It will compare populations sampled in 2018 to those same populations following Hurricane Ian. Information on evolutionary responses (or lack thereof) to increasingly intense and frequent catastrophic weather will be a key component of our understanding of the response of wild populations to global change. The project will also train graduate and undergraduate students in field methods, as well as morphological and genomic and data analyses.Prior work consisted of high-quality genomic, habitat use, and morphological data from brown anoles. Sampling covered 30 populations distributed along the latitudinal extent of Florida and into southern Georgia. Guided by previous research, it is hypothesized that the strength of selection will be correlated with wind speeds, such that stronger winds will favor longer limbs. In addition, the evolutionary response to limb-length selection will be strongly affected by an interaction between a large-effect limb-length locus and the genomic background of brown anole populations. Specifically, there will be a weaker evolutionary response to hurricane-mediated selection on limb length in populations with extensive hybrid ancestry. Previous research found epistatic interactions between an otherwise large-effect locus for limb length and the genomic background for hybrid populations. Because these genomic backgrounds vary across Florida, these effects should vary geographically.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.