Extending Genomics to Natural Communities and Ecosystems

Whitham, Thomas G.; DiFazio, Stephen P.; Schweitzer, Jennifer A.; Shuster, Stephen M.; Allan, Gery J.; Bailey, Joseph K.; Woolbright, Scott A.

doi:10.1126/science.1153918

Cited by 183 publications

(142 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…With this information it will be possible to determine whether certain genes and phenotypic traits have similar consequences in diverse communities and ecosystems, and whether certain traits are more likely to evolve and affect ecological dynamics. In essence, a more mechanistic approach might enable us to make predictions about when a community genetics approach is warranted [5,11,61,80,81].…”

Section: What Are the Phenotypic And Genetic Mechanisms Affecting Commentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, interactions between genotypes of multiple species at different trophic levels (i.e. genotype Â genotype interactions; G Â G) can also shape the ecology of communities [5] and ultimately determine the direction and rate of coevolutionary dynamics [54]. The nature of such G Â G interactions can also be influenced by various factors of the environment, thus resulting in genotype Â genotype Â environment interactions (G Â G Â E), which has formed the foundation of Thompson's Geographic mosaic of coevolution [54].…”

Section: What Is the Relative Importance Of Intraspecific Genetic Varmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Historically, this effort focused on individual species and populations, but more recent studies in 'community genetics' and related disciplines recognize that it might be necessary to unite the diverse theories, concepts and techniques employed in community ecology, evolutionary biology, genetics and genomics to understand the ecology and evolution of interactions among species within communities [3][4][5][6][7]. Community genetics has lured many biologists with diverse interests with the hope that a successful unification of these seemingly disparate fields will bring novel insight and greater predictive power to address basic and applied problems in biology.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Community genetics: what have we accomplished and where should we be going?

Hersch‐Green

Turley

Johnson

2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

118

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Research in community genetics seeks to understand how the dynamic interplay between ecology and evolution shapes simple and complex communities and ecosystems. A community genetics perspective, however, may not be necessary or informative for all studies and systems. To better understand when and how intraspecific genetic variation and microevolution are important in community and ecosystem ecology, we suggest future research should focus on three areas: (i) determining the relative importance of intraspecific genetic variation compared with other ecological factors in mediating community and ecosystem properties; (ii) understanding the importance of microevolution in shaping ecological dynamics in multi-trophic communities; and (iii) deciphering the phenotypic and associated genetic mechanisms that drive community and ecosystem processes. Here, we identify key areas of research that will increase our understanding of the ecology and evolution of complex communities but that are currently missing in community genetics. We then suggest experiments designed to meet these current gaps.

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Section: What Are the Phenotypic And Genetic Mechanisms Affecting Commentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: What Is the Relative Importance Of Intraspecific Genetic Varmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Community genetics: what have we accomplished and where should we be going?

Hersch‐Green

Turley

Johnson

2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

118

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“…Recent reviews in the field of community and ecosystem genetics have provided strong evidence that plant genetic factors can have distinct community and ecosystem phenotypes, that these phenotypes can be heritable and that the community phenotype can feed back to affect the fitness of the individual plant genotypes (Fritz 1999;Whitham et al 1999Whitham et al , 2003Whitham et al , 2006Whitham et al , 2008Bradley & Pregitzer 2007;Johnson & Stinchcombe 2007;Hughes et al 2008). Reviews to date have covered a range of conceptual topics including (i) the role of plant hybridization in maintaining associated biodiversity (Fritz 1999), (ii) genes to ecosystems links (Whitham et al 2003, (iii) the importance of functional genomics to community genetics , (iv) the role of genetically based feedbacks in community genetics (Whitham et al 2003Schweitzer et al 2008b), and (v) the effects of genotypic diversity on community-and ecosystem-level properties Bradley & Pregitzer 2007;Johnson & Stinchcombe 2007;Hughes et al 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

From genes to ecosystems: a synthesis of the effects of plant genetic factors across levels of organization

Bailey

Schweitzer

Úbeda

et al. 2009

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

Self Cite

235

272

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Using two genetic approaches and seven different plant systems, we present findings from a metaanalysis examining the strength of the effects of plant genetic introgression and genotypic diversity across individual, community and ecosystem levels with the goal of synthesizing the patterns to date. We found that (i) the strength of plant genetic effects can be quite high; however, the overall strength of genetic effects on most response variables declined as the levels of organization increased. (ii) Plant genetic effects varied such that introgression had a greater impact on individual phenotypes than extended effects on arthropods or microbes/fungi. By contrast, the greatest effects of genotypic diversity were on arthropods. (iii) Plant genetic effects were greater on above-ground versus below-ground processes, but there was no difference between terrestrial and aquatic environments. (iv) The strength of the effects of intraspecific genotypic diversity tended to be weaker than interspecific genetic introgression. (v) Although genetic effects generally decline across levels of organization, in some cases they do not, suggesting that specific organisms and /or processes may respond more than others to underlying genetic variation. Because patterns in the overall impacts of introgression and genotypic diversity were generally consistent across diverse study systems and consistent with theoretical expectations, these results provide generality for understanding the extended consequences of plant genetic variation across levels of organization, with evolutionary implications.

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“…Lind, Vincent, Weiblen, Cavender‐Bares, and Borer (2015) studied phylogenetic patterns of predator and herbivore community members in a grassland ecosystem. To our knowledge, our study is the first to examine phylogenetic patterns of arthropod communities on hybrid and parental trees and the implications these patterns have for understanding the evolutionary significance of community assembly and structure in foundation trees that are drivers of biodiversity and associated ecosystem processes (Whitham et al., 2006, 2008). …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Arthropod communities on hybrid and parental cottonwoods are phylogenetically structured by tree type: Implications for conservation of biodiversity in plant hybrid zones

Jarvis

Allan

Craig

et al. 2017

Ecology and Evolution

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Although hybridization in plants has been recognized as an important pathway in plant speciation, it may also affect the ecology and evolution of associated communities. Cottonwood species (Populus angustifolia and P. fremontii) and their naturally occurring hybrids are known to support different plant, animal, and microbial communities, but no studies have examined community structure within the context of phylogenetic history. Using a community composed of 199 arthropod species, we tested for differences in arthropod phylogenetic patterns within and among hybrid and parental tree types in a common garden. Three major patterns emerged. (1) Phylogenetic diversity (PD) was significantly different between arthropod communities on hybrids and Fremont cottonwood when pooled by tree type. (2) Mean phylogenetic distance (MPD) and net relatedness index (NRI) indicated that communities on hybrid trees were significantly more phylogenetically overdispersed than communities on either parental tree type. (3) Community distance (D pw) indicated that communities on hybrids were significantly different than parental species. Our results show that arthropod communities on parental and hybrid cottonwoods exhibit significantly different patterns of phylogenetic structure. This suggests that arthropod community assembly is driven, in part, by plant–arthropod interactions at the level of cottonwood tree type. We discuss potential hypotheses to explain the effect of plant genetic dissimilarity on arthropod phylogenetic community structure, including the role of competition and environmental filtering. Our findings suggest that cottonwood species and their hybrids function as evolutionarily significant units (ESUs) that affect the assembly and composition of associated arthropod communities and deserve high priority for conservation.

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Extending Genomics to Natural Communities and Ecosystems

Cited by 183 publications

References 23 publications

Community genetics: what have we accomplished and where should we be going?

Community genetics: what have we accomplished and where should we be going?

From genes to ecosystems: a synthesis of the effects of plant genetic factors across levels of organization

Arthropod communities on hybrid and parental cottonwoods are phylogenetically structured by tree type: Implications for conservation of biodiversity in plant hybrid zones

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