Skip Navigation


MBE Advance Access originally published online on January 8, 2009
Molecular Biology and Evolution 2009 26(4):829-841; doi:10.1093/molbev/msp004
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Supplementary Data
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
26/4/829    most recent
msp004v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Nadachowska, K.
Right arrow Articles by Babik, W.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Nadachowska, K.
Right arrow Articles by Babik, W.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Research Articles

Divergence in the Face of Gene Flow: The Case of Two Newts (Amphibia: Salamandridae)

Krystyna Nadachowska* and Wieslaw Babik{dagger},{ddagger}

* Jagiellonian University, Institute of Environmental Sciences, Kraków, Poland
{dagger} Department of Community Ecology, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research—UFZ, Halle/Saale, Germany
{ddagger} Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals, Polish Academy of Sciences, Kraków, Poland

E-mail: wieslaw.babik{at}uj.edu.pl.

Accepted for publication January 5, 2009.

Understanding the process of divergence requires the quantitative characterization of patterns of gene flow between diverging taxa. New and powerful coalescent-based methods give insight into these processes in unprecedented details by enabling the reconstruction of the temporal distribution of past gene flow. Here, we use sequence variation at eight nuclear markers and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) in multiple populations to study diversity, divergence, and gene flow between two subspecies of a salamander, the smooth newt (Lissotriton vulgaris kosswigi and Lissotriton vulgaris vulgaris) in Turkey. The ranges of both subspecies encompass mainly the areas of this important glacial refugial area. Populations in refugia where species have been present for a long time and differentiated in situ should better preserve the record of past gene flow than young populations in postglacial expansion areas. Sequence diversity in both subspecies was substantial (nuclear {pi}sil = 0.69% and 1.31%). We detected long-term demographic stability in these refugial populations with large effective population sizes (Ne) of the order of 1.5–3 x 105 individuals. Gene trees and the isolation with migration (IM) analysis complemented by tests of nested IM models showed that despite deep, pre-Pleistocene divergence of the studied newts, asymmetric introgression from vulgaris to kosswigi has occurred, with signatures of recent gene flow in mtDNA and an anonymous nuclear marker, and evidence for more ancient introgression in nuclear introns. The distribution of migration times raises the intriguing possibility that even the initial divergence may have occurred in the face of gene flow.

Key Words: Lissotriton vulgaris • divergence • gene flow • nucleotide variation • isolation with migration

Jody Hey, Associate Editor


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.