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Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau
BACKGROUND: Due to the environmental heterogeneity along elevation gradients, alpine ecosystems are ideal study objects for investigating how ecological variables shape the genetic patterns of natural species. The highest region in the world, the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, is a hotspot for the studies...
Autores principales: | , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2019
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6921560/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31856717 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12862-019-1559-0 |
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author | Wu, Zhigang Xu, Xinwei Zhang, Juan Wiegleb, Gerhard Hou, Hongwei |
author_facet | Wu, Zhigang Xu, Xinwei Zhang, Juan Wiegleb, Gerhard Hou, Hongwei |
author_sort | Wu, Zhigang |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Due to the environmental heterogeneity along elevation gradients, alpine ecosystems are ideal study objects for investigating how ecological variables shape the genetic patterns of natural species. The highest region in the world, the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, is a hotspot for the studies of evolutionary processes in plants. Many large rivers spring from the plateau, providing abundant habitats for aquatic and amphibious organisms. In the present study, we examined the genetic diversity of 13 Ranunculus subrigidus populations distributed throughout the plateau in order to elucidate the relative contribution of geographic distance and environmental dissimilarity to the spatial genetic pattern. RESULTS: A relatively low level of genetic diversity within populations was found. No spatial genetic structure was suggested by the analyses of molecular variance, Bayesian clustering analysis and Mantel tests. Partial Mantel tests and multiple matrix regression analysis showed a significant influence of the environment on the genetic divergence of the species. Both climatic and water quality variables contribute to the habitat heterogeneity of R. subrigidus populations. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that historical processes involving long-distance dispersal and local adaptation may account for the genetic patterns of R. subrigidus and current environmental factors play an important role in the genetic differentiation and local adaptation of aquatic plants in alpine landscapes. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6921560 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-69215602019-12-30 Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau Wu, Zhigang Xu, Xinwei Zhang, Juan Wiegleb, Gerhard Hou, Hongwei BMC Evol Biol Research Article BACKGROUND: Due to the environmental heterogeneity along elevation gradients, alpine ecosystems are ideal study objects for investigating how ecological variables shape the genetic patterns of natural species. The highest region in the world, the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, is a hotspot for the studies of evolutionary processes in plants. Many large rivers spring from the plateau, providing abundant habitats for aquatic and amphibious organisms. In the present study, we examined the genetic diversity of 13 Ranunculus subrigidus populations distributed throughout the plateau in order to elucidate the relative contribution of geographic distance and environmental dissimilarity to the spatial genetic pattern. RESULTS: A relatively low level of genetic diversity within populations was found. No spatial genetic structure was suggested by the analyses of molecular variance, Bayesian clustering analysis and Mantel tests. Partial Mantel tests and multiple matrix regression analysis showed a significant influence of the environment on the genetic divergence of the species. Both climatic and water quality variables contribute to the habitat heterogeneity of R. subrigidus populations. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that historical processes involving long-distance dispersal and local adaptation may account for the genetic patterns of R. subrigidus and current environmental factors play an important role in the genetic differentiation and local adaptation of aquatic plants in alpine landscapes. BioMed Central 2019-12-19 /pmc/articles/PMC6921560/ /pubmed/31856717 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12862-019-1559-0 Text en © The Author(s). 2019 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Wu, Zhigang Xu, Xinwei Zhang, Juan Wiegleb, Gerhard Hou, Hongwei Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title | Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title_full | Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title_fullStr | Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title_full_unstemmed | Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title_short | Influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte Ranunculus subrigidus on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau |
title_sort | influence of environmental factors on the genetic variation of the aquatic macrophyte ranunculus subrigidus on the qinghai-tibetan plateau |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6921560/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31856717 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12862-019-1559-0 |
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