No. 914

Title:

Quantitative assessment of spatial genetic structures resulted from gene flow and their visualization

Author(s):

Shimatani Kenichiro(The Institute of Statistical Mathematics), Saito Daisuke(Hiroshima University), Kawaguchi Hideyuki(Shimane University), Tateno Ryunosuke(Kyoto University), Isagi Yuji(Hiroshima University)

Key words:

pollen flow, seed dispersal, female reproductive success, spatial genetic structure, gene flow

Abstract:

Genes move between plants through reproduction, that is called as gene flow. There are various statistical methods quantifying current spatial genetic structures of populations, some of which can be used for indirect estimation about the amount of gene flow, and recent development of highly polymorphic markers enables us to identify gene flow between individuals. Nonetheless, none of the previous methods provides satisfactory visual image about continuously changing spatial genetic structure as a result of gene flow and reproduction. This study developed visualization techniques illustrating spatial genetic structures on commonly used spreadsheet files. Combining with basic gene flow models over two generations, we can quantitatively assess effects of ecological factors in reproduction on spatial genetic structures of offspring, together with visual illustrations. In particular, depending on a population, spatial genetic structure is largely determined by the density of parents rather than distances of pollen and seed dispersal, and if the ratio of adults that maternally succeed in reproduction is small, extensive pollen flow is necessary for preserving the current genetic diversity, which are quantitatively shown by models and graphs.