Genomic divergence in allopatric Northern Cardinals of the North American warm deserts is linked to behavioral differentiation.

ABSTRACT: Biogeographic barriers are considered important in initiating speciation through geographic isolation, but they rarely indiscriminately and completely reduce gene flow across entire communities. Explicitly demonstrating which factors are associated with gene-flow levels across barriers would help elucidate how speciation is initiated and isolation maintained. Here, we investigated the association of behavioral isolation on population differentiation in Northern Cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis) distributed across the Cochise Filter Barrier, a region of transitional habitat which separates the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts of North America. Using genomewide markers, we modeled demographic history by fitting the data to isolation and isolation-with-migration models. The best-fit mode

SUBMITTER: Provost KL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6309012 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature