Selection drives divergence of eye morphology in sympatric Heliconius butterflies.

ABSTRACT: When populations experience different sensory conditions, natural selection may favor sensory system divergence, affecting peripheral structures and/or downstream neural pathways. We characterized the outer eye morphology of sympatric Heliconius butterflies from different forest types and their first-generation reciprocal hybrids to test for adaptive visual system divergence and hybrid disruption. In Panama, Heliconius cydno occurs in closed forests, whereas Heliconius melpomene resides at the forest edge. Among wild individuals, H. cydno has larger eyes than H. melpomene, and there are heritable, habitat-associated differences in the visual brain structures that exceed neutral divergence expectations. Notably, hybrids have intermediate neural phenotypes, suggesting disruption. To test for

SUBMITTER: Wright DS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7616201 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature