PLEASE NOTE: Application deadline date 08 Jan 2024. Applications are no longer being accepted for this project
Project Overview
We lack an understanding of the causes and constraints underlying the outcomes of hybridisation, and therefore have limited ability to predict how species redistribution due to climate change will negatively affect native species. This project will help fill this gap with important consequences for understanding biodiversity and conservation planning.
Project Description
The outcomes of hybridisation can range from a single sterile offspring to a new species or the genetic degradation of the parents, yet fundamentally we lack an understanding of the causes and constraints underlying these outcomes. Understanding these factors means we can better predict the potential for species redistribution due to climate change and human activity to negatively affect native species. Of central importance is the how genetic and ecological divergence between the species that come into contact affects the likelihood of hybridisation.
This project will examine these questions in groups of British plants that are known to hybridise. Genome-scale data will assess genomic divergence and determine the extent of hybridization in the wild, including identifying regions of introgression and reproductive isolation. Based on a preliminary study of one genus we have determined that our approach resolves a few thousand genetic markers (instead of previous work using one or two genes) and can easily be expanded to multiple genera to give a broad understanding across plant families. This will entail making collections from the wild (with approval where necessary and including a citizen science approach), growing plants from seed, DNA extraction, sequencing, phylogenetic and population genomic analysis, and hypothesis testing. The British flora is the best studied with respect to hybridization, with a wealth of knowledge available (e.g., Stace’s “Hybrid Flora of the British Isles”), and this project will allow low resolution approaches (e.g., Brown et al., 2023, see below) to be examined with better certainty and depth.
The INSPIRE DTP programme provides comprehensive personal and professional development training alongside extensive opportunities for students to expand their multi-disciplinary outlook through interactions with a wide network of academic, research and industrial/policy partners. The student will be registered and hosted at the University of Southampton. Specific training will include:
Field collection and plant identification
Working with herbarium material, including ancient DNA
Working with stakeholders
DNA extraction and quantification
Using R and other command line packages to analyse big data.
Genome-scale data analysis, phylogenetics and population genetics
Scientific writing and statistics
Brown et al. (2023). Genetic factors predict hybrid formation in the British flora. PNAS 120: e2220261120
Jackson et al. (2023) The role of geography, ecology, and hybridization in the evolutionary history of Canary Island Descurainia. Amer J Bot 110:e16162
White et al. (2020) Geographical isolation, habitat shifts and hybridisation in the diversification of the Macaronesian endemic genus Argyranthemum (Asteraceae). New Phyt 228:1953
