Are genes faster than crabs? Mitochondrial introgression exceeds larval dispersal during population expansion of the invasive crab Carcinus maenas.

ABSTRACT: Biological invasions offer unique opportunities to investigate evolutionary dynamics at the peripheries of expanding populations. Here, we examine genetic patterns associated with admixture between two distinct invasive lineages of the European green crab, Carcinus maenas L., independently introduced to the northwest Atlantic. Previous investigations based on mitochondrial DNA sequences demonstrated that larval dispersal driven by advective currents could explain observed southward displacement of an admixture zone between the two invasions. Comparison of published mitochondrial results with new nuclear data from nine microsatellite loci, however, reveals striking discordance in their introgression patterns. Specifically, introgression of mitochondrial genomes relative to nuclear backgroun

SUBMITTER: Darling JA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4448889 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature