Stark sexual display divergence among jumping spider populations in the face of gene flow.

Gene flow can inhibit evolutionary divergence by eroding genetic differences between populations. A current aim in speciation research is to identify conditions in which selection overcomes this process. We focused on a state of limited differentiation, asking whether selection enables divergence with gene flow in a set of Habronattus americanus jumping spider populations that exhibit three distinct male sexual display morphs.

Origin of a novel regulatory module by duplication and degeneration of an ancient plant transcription factor.

It is commonly believed that gene duplications provide the raw material for morphological evolution. Both the number of genes and size of gene families have increased during the diversification of land plants. Several small proteins that regulate transcription factors have recently been identified in plants, including the LITTLE ZIPPER (ZPR) proteins.

The future of the northeast Atlantic benthic flora in a high CO2 world.

Seaweed and seagrass communities in the northeast Atlantic have been profoundly impacted by humans, and the rate of change is accelerating rapidly due to runaway CO2 emissions and mounting pressures on coastlines associated with human population growth and increased consumption of finite resources. Here, we predict how rapid warming and acidification are likely to affect benthic flora and coastal ecosystems of the northeast Atlantic in this century, based on global evidence from the literature as interpreted by the collective knowledge of the authorship. We predict that warming will kill off kelp forests in the south and that ocean acidification will remove maerl habitat in the north.

Hydration history and attachment morphology regulate seed release in Chorizanthe rigida (Polygonaceae), a serotinous desert annual.

• Premise of the study: Most seed dispersal studies focus on the spatial aspects of propagule dissemination, i.e., the movement of seeds away from the mother plant.

Accelerated rate of molecular evolution for vittarioid ferns is strong and not driven by selection.

Molecular evolutionary rate heterogeneity-the violation of a molecular clock-is a prominent feature of many phylogenetic data sets. It has particular importance to systematists not only because of its biological implications, but also for its practical effects on our ability to infer and date evolutionary events. Here we show, using both maximum likelihood and Bayesian approaches, that a remarkably strong increase in substitution rate in the vittarioid ferns is consistent across the nuclear and plastid genomes.

Soil nutrients trump intraspecific effects on understory plant communities.

Understanding the links between intraspecific genetic variation and patterns of diversity in associated communities has been the primary focus of community genetics or 'genes-to-ecosystem' research in ecology. While other ecological factors, such as the abiotic environment, have well-documented influences on communities, the relative contributions of genetic variation versus the environment to species interactions remains poorly explored. In this study, we use a common garden experiment to study a coastal dune plant community dominated by the shrub, Baccharis pilularis, which displays a morphological dimorphism in plant architecture.

Bacterial biofilms in a 'genes-to-ecosystems' context.

In ecology, there is an increasing amount of research dedicated to understanding how intraspecific genetic diversity can extend beyond the population level to influence the assembly of communities and the functioning of ecosystems. In this issue of Molecular Ecology, Koh et al. (2012) take this exploration to a new level using bacterial biofilms and protozoan grazers.