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© 2008. This work is published under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Estimating genetic connectivity in disturbed riverine landscapes is of key importance for river restoration. However, few species of the disturbed riverine fauna may provide a detailed and basin-wide picture of the human impact on the population genetics of riverine organisms. Here we used the most abundant native fish, the three-spined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus L.), to detect the geographical determinants of genetic connectivity in the eastern part of the Scheldt basin in Belgium. Anthropogenic structures came out as the strongest determinant of population structure, when evaluated against a geographically well-documented baseline model accounting for natural effects. These barriers not only affected genetic diversity, but they also controlled the balance between gene flow and genetic drift, and therefore may crucially disrupt the population structure of sticklebacks. Landscape models explained a high percentage of variation (allelic richness: adjusted R2 = 0.78; pairwise FST: adjusted R2 = 0.60), and likely apply to other species as well. River restoration and conservation genetics may highly benefit from riverine landscape genetics, including model building, the detection of outlier populations, and a specific test for the geographical factors controlling the balance between gene flow and genetic drift.

Details

Title
Modeling genetic connectivity in sticklebacks as a guideline for river restoration
Author
Raeymaekers, Joost A M 1 ; Maes, Gregory E 1 ; Geldof, Sarah 1 ; Hontis, Ingrid 1 ; Nackaerts, Kris 2 ; Volckaert, Filip A M 1 

  Laboratory for Animal Biodiversity and Systematics, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium 
  InterGraph Belgium NV, Tennessee House, Riverside Business Park, Brussels, Belgium 
Section
Original Articles
Publication year
2008
Publication date
Aug 2008
Publisher
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
e-ISSN
17524571
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
3067244421
Copyright
© 2008. This work is published under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.