Melanic pigmentation and light preference within and between two Drosophila species.

ABSTRACT: Environmental adaptation and species divergence often involve suites of co-evolving traits. Pigmentation in insects presents a variable, adaptive, and well-characterized class of phenotypes for which correlations with multiple other traits have been demonstrated. In Drosophila, the pigmentation genes ebony and tan have pleiotropic effects on flies' response to light, creating the potential for correlated evolution of pigmentation and vision. Here, we investigate differences in light preference within and between two sister species, Drosophila americana and D. novamexicana, which differ in pigmentation in part because of evolution at ebony and tan and occupy environments that differ in many variables including solar radiation. We hypothesized

SUBMITTER: Cooley AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8462139 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature