Evidence for environmental and ecological selection in a microbe with no geographic limits to gene flow.

ABSTRACT: The ability for organisms to disperse throughout their environment is thought to strongly influence population structure and thus evolution of diversity within species. A decades-long debate surrounds processes that generate and support high microbial diversity, particularly in the ocean. The debate concerns whether diversification occurs primarily through geographic partitioning (where distance limits gene flow) or through environmental selection, and remains unresolved due to lack of empirical data. Here we show that gene flow in a diatom, an ecologically important eukaryotic microbe, is not limited by global-scale geographic distance. Instead, environmental and ecological selection likely play a more significant role than dispersal in generating and maintaining diversity. We detected si

SUBMITTER: Whittaker KA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5347567 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature