The genomic basis of adaptation to changing environments: applications to wildlife conservation

人类对环境的改变，包括大规模的栖息地转换和温室气体排放飙升，对全球生物多样性构成了重大威胁，直接与灭绝速度的提高有关，灭绝速度是本底水平的100至1000倍。保持物种在不断变化的环境中坚持的能力最终意味着保存生态重要特征下的遗传变异。过去三十年来的保护遗传学研究在了解遗传和进化过程以及描绘与管理濒危种群有关的模式方面发挥了重要作用。然而，主要悬而未决的问题仍然存在，主要与识别与适应相关的功能性遗传变异有关，以解开漂移和选择在观察到的模式下的相对作用，并探索与种群如何适应不断变化的环境有关的含义。这种持续不断的挑战背后的一个主要原因是我们无法直接在具有保护价值的物种的自然种群中直接分析大范围的适应性遗传变异。群体基因组学提供了一种强大的方法，可以将异常点形式的特定基因座效应与中性进化过程所支配的全基因组效应区分开来。我的研究项目将下一代DNA测序和基因分型技术的力量与景观和种群基因组学的分析框架相结合，以测试对快速环境变化的进化结果的预测，并探索它们对保护的影响。主要的研究生物体是美洲鼠兔(Ochotona Princeps)，一种不连续分布在北美西部山区的小型滞育动物。鉴于人们普遍认为美洲鼠兔是高海拔的专职栖息地专家，一些人预测，由于气候变化的直接影响，美洲鼠兔将成为第一个灭绝的哺乳动物物种。这项工作将对理解区域和景观尺度上的生物对气候变化的反应具有重要意义，同时评估将进化潜力知识与其他关键因素(生境质量、生态、行为)相结合的新方法，以告知保护优先顺序。该项目还将在培养两名博士、三名硕士和十名本科生方面发挥基础性作用。随着基因组工具超越个别学科，学生将有能力在学术界、政府或私营部门追求一系列不同的职业机会。此外，拟议的研究将通过Science LIVE提供K-12扩展的机会，为制定教案提供主题，并通过现场的网络研讨会和博客将当地社区的教室与我们的研究团队联系起来。

Human modification of the environment, including large-scale habitat conversion and soaring greenhouse gas emissions, pose major threats to global biological diversity, directly linked to enhanced extinction rates 100 to 1,000 times greater than background levels. Maintaining species’ ability to persist in changing environments ultimately means preserving genetic variation underlying ecologically important traits. Conservation genetic studies over the past three decades have played an important role in understanding genetic and evolutionary processes and in delineating the patterns that are relevant to managing endangered populations. However, major unresolved questions remain, largely associated with identifying fitness-related functional genetic variation for disentangling the relative roles of drift and selection underlying observed patterns and for exploring implications associated with how populations may adapt to changing environments. A main reason underlying this persistent challenge has been our inability to directly assay adaptive genetic variation at a broad-scale in natural populations of species of conservation interest. Population genomics provides a powerful approach for separating locus-specific effects in the form of outlier loci from genome-wide effects governed by neutral evolutionary processes. My research program combines the power of next-generation DNA sequencing and genotyping technologies with the analytical frameworks of landscape and population genomics to test predictions about the evolutionary outcomes of rapid environmental change and to explore their implications for conservation. The primary study organism is the American pika (Ochotona princeps), a small lagomorph discontinuously distributed in mountainous areas throughout western North America. Given its general perception as a high-elevation obligate, habitat specialist, the American pika has been predicted by some to become the first mammalian species to go extinct due to the direct effects of climate change. This work will have important implications for understanding biotic responses to climate change at the regional and landscape scales, while evaluating novel approaches for integrating knowledge of evolutionary potential with other critical factors (habitat quality, ecology, behavior) for informing conservation prioritization. This program will also play a fundamental role in training two PhD, three MSc, and ten undergraduate students. As genomic tools transcend individual disciplines, students will be equipped to pursue a diverse set of career opportunities within academia, government or the private sector. Moreover, the proposed research will offer opportunities for K-12 outreach through ScienceLIVE, providing subject matter for developing lesson plans and connecting classrooms within local communities to our research team through webinars and blogs from the field.