Polygenic evolution drives species divergence and climate adaptation in corals

• DOI: 10.1111/evo.13385
• Publication Date: 2017-11-03T08:59:46Z
• Authors: Noah H. Rose; Rachael A. Bay; Megan K. Morikawa; Stephen R. Palumbi
• Keywords: Genetic divergence

Closely related species often show substantial differences in ecological traits that allow them to occupy different environmental niches. For few of these systems is it clear what the genomic basis adaptation and whether a loci major effect or many genome-wide drive divergence. Four cryptic tabletop coral Acropora hyacinthus are broadly sympatric American Samoa; here we two common have key such as microhabitat distributions thermal stress tolerance. We compared gene expression patterns genetic polymorphism between using RNA-Seq. The vast majority polymorphisms shared species, but widespread allele frequencies expression, tend host symbiont types. find changes regulatory variants, consistent with action drift. However, observe greater divergence amino acid replacement synonymous variants. These findings suggest polygenic evolution plays role driving ecology resilience climate change.