Uncovering anthocyanin diversity in potato landraces (Solanum tuberosum L. Phureja) using RNA-seq.

Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is the third largest source of antioxidants in the human diet, after maize and tomato. Potato landraces have particularly diverse contents of antioxidant compounds such as anthocyanins.

Adaptive divergence in shoot gravitropism creates hybrid sterility in an Australian wildflower.

Natural selection is responsible for much of the diversity we see in nature. Just as it drives the evolution of new traits, it can also lead to new species. However, it is unclear whether natural selection conferring adaptation to local environments can drive speciation through the evolution of hybrid sterility between populations.

Correlated evolution of self and interspecific incompatibility across the range of a Texas wildflower.

Selection to prevent interspecific mating can cause an increase or a decrease in self-pollination in sympatric populations. Characterizing the geographical variation in self and interspecific incompatibilities within a species can reveal if and how the evolution of self and interspecific mate choice are linked. We used controlled pollinations to characterize the variation in self and interspecific incompatibility across 29 populations of Phlox drummondii.

Genomic clustering of adaptive loci during parallel evolution of an Australian wildflower.

The build-up of the phenotypic differences that distinguish species has long intrigued biologists. These differences are often inherited as stable polymorphisms that allow the cosegregation of adaptive variation within species, and facilitate the differentiation of complex phenotypes between species. It has been suggested that the clustering of adaptive loci could facilitate this process, but evidence is still scarce.

Genomic evidence of gene flow during reinforcement in Texas Phlox.

Gene flow can impede the evolution of reproductive isolating barriers between species. Reinforcement is the process by which prezygotic reproductive isolation evolves in sympatry due to selection to decrease costly hybridization. It is known that reinforcement can be prevented by too much gene flow, but we still do not know how often have prezygotic barriers evolved in the presence of gene flow or how much gene flow can occur during reinforcement.

Hybridization in Plants: Old Ideas, New Techniques.

Hybridization has played an important role in the evolution of many lineages. With the growing availability of genomic tools and advancements in genomic analyses, it is becoming increasingly clear that gene flow between divergent taxa can generate new phenotypic diversity, allow for adaptation to novel environments, and contribute to speciation. Hybridization can have immediate phenotypic consequences through the expression of hybrid vigor.

Convergence and divergence during the adaptation to similar environments by an Australian groundsel.

Adaptation to replicate environments is often achieved through similar phenotypic solutions. Whether selection also produces convergent genomic changes in these situations remains largely unknown. The variable groundsel, Senecio lautus, is an excellent system to investigate the genetic underpinnings of convergent evolution, because morphologically similar forms of these plants have adapted to the same environments along the coast of Australia.

Genomic evidence for the parallel evolution of coastal forms in the Senecio lautus complex.

Instances of parallel ecotypic divergence where adaptation to similar conditions repeatedly cause similar phenotypic changes in closely related organisms are useful for studying the role of ecological selection in speciation. Here we used a combination of traditional and next generation genotyping techniques to test for the parallel divergence of plants from the Senecio lautus complex, a phenotypically variable groundsel that has adapted to disparate environments in the South Pacific. Phylogenetic analysis of a broad selection of Senecio species showed that members of the S.