Genetic patterns reveal geographic drivers of divergence in silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis)

Annika Radu; Christine L Dudgeon; Sonya Clegg; Yasmin Foster; Alexis L Levengood; Ashley Sendell-Price; Kathy Townsend; Dominique Potvin

doi:10.1038/s41598-024-71364-9

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Genetic patterns reveal geographic drivers of divergence in silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis)

Journal article

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Genetic patterns reveal geographic drivers of divergence in silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis)

Annika Radu, Christine L Dudgeon, Sonya Clegg, Yasmin Foster, Alexis L Levengood, Ashley Sendell-Price, Kathy Townsend and Dominique Potvin

Scientific Reports, Vol.14, pp.1-9

2024

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-71364-9

PMCID: PMC11372117

PMID: 39227633

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Abstract

islands

founder effect

subspecies

SNPs

population genetic diversity

Identifying mechanisms that drive population divergence under varying geographic and ecological scenarios can inform our understanding of evolution and speciation. In particular, analysis of genetic data from island populations with known colonisation timelines allows us to identify potential source populations of diverging island subspecies and current relationships among populations. Silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis) are a small passerine that have served as a valuable study system to investigate evolutionary patterns on both large and small geographic scales. We examined genetic relatedness and diversity of two silvereye subspecies, the mainland Z. l. cornwalli and island Z. l. chlorocephalus, and used 18 077 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), to compare locations across southeast Queensland, Australia. Although silvereyes are prolific island colonisers our findings revealed population divergence over relatively small spatial scales was strongly influenced by geographic isolation mediated by water barriers. Strong genetic connectivity was displayed between mainland sites, but minimal inter-island connectivity was shown despite comparable sampling distances. Genetic diversity analysis showed little difference in heterozygosity between island and mainland populations, but lower inbreeding scores among the island populations. Our study confirmed the range of the Z. l. chlorocephalus subspecies throughout the southern Great Barrier Reef. Our results show that water barriers and not geographic distance per se are important in driving incipient divergence in island populations. This helps to explain the relatively high number of phenotypically differentiated, but often geographically proximate, island silvereye subspecies compared to a lower number of phenotypically less well-defined Australian continental subspecies.

Details

Title: Genetic patterns reveal geographic drivers of divergence in silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis)
Authors: Annika Radu (Corresponding Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Christine L Dudgeon (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Sonya Clegg (Author) - University of Oxford
Yasmin Foster (Author) - University of Otago
Alexis L Levengood (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Ashley Sendell-Price (Author) - University of Oxford
Kathy Townsend (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Dominique Potvin (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Publication details: Scientific Reports, Vol.14, pp.1-9
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
Date published: 2024
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-71364-9
ISSN: 2045-2322
PMID: 39227633; PMC11372117
Copyright note: © The Author(s) 2024 This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Data Availability: The datasets generated and analysed during the current study are available in the OSF repository: https://osf.io/g4m7p/?view_ only=08a01674cde54a6 79a3612505c3d7f 52.
Grant note: This project was funded by the University of the Sunshine Coast and the Reef Islands Initiative, a Great Barrier Reef Foundation program, supported by Lendlease, the Australian Government’s Reef Trust, the Queensland Government and the Fitzgerald Family Foundation.
Organisation Unit: School of Science, Technology and Engineering
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991058998902621
Output Type: Journal article

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