Dealing With Assumptions and Sampling Bias in the Estimation of Effective Population Size: A Case Study in an Amphibian Population

IF 3.5 2区 生物学 Q1 EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY
Karen Cox, Sabrina Neyrinck, Joachim Mergeay
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Abstract

Accurately estimating effective population size (Ne) is essential for understanding evolutionary processes and guiding conservation efforts. This study investigates Ne estimation methods in spatially structured populations using a population of moor frog (Rana arvalis) as a case study. We assessed the behaviour of Ne estimates derived from the linkage disequilibrium (LD) method as we changed the spatial configuration of samples. Moor frog eggs were sampled from 25 breeding patches (i.e., separate vernal ponds, ditches or parts of larger fens) within a single population, revealing an isolation-by-distance pattern and a local spatial genetic structure. Varying buffer sizes around each patch were used to examine the impact of sampling window size on the estimation of effective number of breeders (Nb). Our results indicate a downward bias in LD Nb estimates with increasing buffer size, suggesting an underestimation of Nb. The observed bias is attributed to LD resulting from including genetically divergent individuals (mixture-LD) confounding LD due to drift. This emphasises the significance of considering even subtle spatial genetic patterns. The implications of these findings are discussed, emphasising the need to account for spatial genetic structure to accurately assess population viability and inform conservation efforts. This study contributes to our understanding of the challenges associated with Ne estimation in spatially structured populations and underscores the importance of refining methodologies to address population-specific spatial dynamics for effective conservation planning and management.

Abstract Image

处理有效种群数量估算中的假设和取样偏差:两栖动物种群案例研究
准确估计有效种群规模(Ne)对于了解进化过程和指导保护工作至关重要。本研究以沼泽蛙(Rana arvalis)种群为例,探讨了空间结构种群的Ne估计方法。我们评估了联系不平衡(LD)方法得出的Ne估计值在改变样本空间结构时的表现。我们从一个种群中的 25 个繁殖斑块(即独立的春池塘、沟渠或较大沼泽的一部分)中对沼蛙卵进行了采样,发现了一种按距离隔离的模式和局部空间遗传结构。我们利用每个斑块周围不同的缓冲区大小来研究取样窗口大小对有效繁殖者数量(Nb)估算的影响。我们的结果表明,随着缓冲区大小的增加,LD Nb估计值会向下偏移,这表明Nb被低估了。观察到的偏差归因于包含基因差异个体(混合物-LD)的 LD 与漂移导致的 LD 相混淆。这强调了考虑微妙空间遗传模式的重要性。本文讨论了这些发现的影响,强调了考虑空间遗传结构以准确评估种群生存能力并为保护工作提供信息的必要性。这项研究有助于我们理解在空间结构种群中估计Ne所面临的挑战,并强调了改进方法以解决种群特定空间动态问题的重要性,从而实现有效的保护规划和管理。
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来源期刊
Evolutionary Applications
Evolutionary Applications 生物-进化生物学
CiteScore
8.50
自引率
7.30%
发文量
175
审稿时长
6 months
期刊介绍: Evolutionary Applications is a fully peer reviewed open access journal. It publishes papers that utilize concepts from evolutionary biology to address biological questions of health, social and economic relevance. Papers are expected to employ evolutionary concepts or methods to make contributions to areas such as (but not limited to): medicine, agriculture, forestry, exploitation and management (fisheries and wildlife), aquaculture, conservation biology, environmental sciences (including climate change and invasion biology), microbiology, and toxicology. All taxonomic groups are covered from microbes, fungi, plants and animals. In order to better serve the community, we also now strongly encourage submissions of papers making use of modern molecular and genetic methods (population and functional genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, epigenetics, quantitative genetics, association and linkage mapping) to address important questions in any of these disciplines and in an applied evolutionary framework. Theoretical, empirical, synthesis or perspective papers are welcome.
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