Oral Presentation Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution Conference 2016

Convergence in the genomics of local adaptation to climate in conifers (#256)

Kathryn Hodgins 1 , Sam Yeaman 2 , Jason Holiday 3 , Katie Lotterhos 4 , Haktan Suren 3 , Laura Gray 5 , Simon Nadeau 6 , Kristin Nurkowski 1 7 , Loren Rieseberg 7 , Mike Whitlock 8 , Sally Aitken 6
  1. Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia
  2. University of Calgary, Calgary
  3. Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg
  4. Department of Marine and Environmental Science, Northeastern, Nahant
  5. Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, Edmonton
  6. Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver
  7. Botany, University of British Columbia, Vancouver
  8. Zoology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver

When confronted with a selective challenge, theoretical and empirical results reveal that closely related taxa often evolve similar phenotypes from the same genes. However, evolutionary convergence on the genetic level is thought to be less likely in more distantly related species, because of differences in genetic background and a lack of shared standing variation, although this has not been tested at the genome scale. Here, we provide the first population genomic study of convergent local adaptation to the same climatic gradients between two species diverged for more than 140 million years, lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) and interior spruce (Picea glaucaPicea engelmannii and their hybrids). Using sequence capture approach that targeted the exome of both species, we used environment allele associations, and phenotype allele associations to identify candidate regions of the genome associated with local adaptation to climate. Our comparative analysis of these regions finds that adaptation to temperature shows polygenic signatures of convergence at the phenotypic and genomic level. This suggests that adaptation to climate is somewhat genetically constrained, with key genes, particularly transcription factors, playing non-redundant roles.