11
views
0
recommends
+1 Recommend
0 collections
    0
    shares
      • Record: found
      • Abstract: found
      • Article: not found

      Landscape genetics of the self-compatible forest herb Geum urbanum: effects of habitat age, fragmentation and local environment.

      1 , , ,
      Molecular ecology
      Wiley-Blackwell

      Read this article at

      ScienceOpenPublisherPubMed
      Bookmark
          There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

          Abstract

          To investigate the role of habitat fragmentation, fragment age and local environment in shaping the genetics of plant populations, we examined the genetic structure of the self-compatible forest herb Geum urbanum using microsatellite markers. A historical land-use reconstruction assigned the studied populations to two age classes: populations in primary forest fragments, and populations in secondary fragments. Local environmental conditions were quantified on the basis of the herb-layer community composition. A stepwise general linear model revealed that levels of within-population genetic diversity were best explained by population size, landscape connectivity and the interaction between both. Connectivity was positively correlated with the genetic diversity of small populations, but did not significantly affect the diversity of large populations. Contrary to what we expected, secondary-forest populations showed lower divergence relative to populations located in primary patches. Small populations were genetically more diverged compared to large populations. Mantel tests showed no significant isolation by distance and no significant correlation between habitat similarity and genetic differentiation. We conclude that gene flow has probably prevented founder events from being reflected in the present genetic structure of G. urbanum. Gene flow towards low-connectivity populations, however, seemed to be insufficient to counteract the effects of drift in small populations.

          Related collections

          Author and article information

          Journal
          Mol. Ecol.
          Molecular ecology
          Wiley-Blackwell
          0962-1083
          0962-1083
          Oct 2007
          : 16
          : 19
          Affiliations
          [1 ] Laboratory of Plant Ecology, Biology Department, University of Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 31, B-3001 Heverlee, Belgium. katrien.vandepitte@ilvo.vlaanderen.be
          Article
          MEC3473
          10.1111/j.1365-294X.2007.03473.x
          17784918
          9bfd36f4-f1e4-4d5d-963a-ff36cb22fb84
          History

          Comments

          Comment on this article