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The invasion success of a species in an agrosystem is greatly influenced by environmental factors such as the use of insecticides, by the intrinsic evolutionary capabilities of the species, and also by interactions with resident species. On the island of La Réunion, the successive invasions of MEAM1 and MED whitefly species over the last 20 years have not only led an increased use of insecticides, but have also challenged the resident IO species. To trace the evolution of the 3 species, and the distribution of the kdr mutation (resistance to pyrethroid) in the para-type voltage-gated sodium channel, we genotyped 41 populations (using neutral nuclear markers) and look at the prevalence of the kdr allele. MEAM1 was predominantly present in agrosystems showing quasi fixation of the resistant kdr allele whereas IO was mainly in natural environments and did not have any resistant allele. Hybridization between the two former species was detected in low frequency but has not led to introgression of resistant alleles in the resident species so far. MED showed a limited distribution in agrosystems but all individuals displayed a resistant allele. These highly contrasting patterns of distribution and resistant mutations between invasive and resident whitefly species are further discussed.

Background Hyalomma marginatum is a hard tick vector of various pathogens, including Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic fever virus, recently detected in French specimens. This species has a wide distribution from North Africa to Eastern Europe and has only recently been considered established in Southern France. These changes in species distribution led us to explore the genetic structure of tick populations in the Mediterranean basin and attempt to infer the origin of French populations. Methods We used two mitochondrial markers (12S rRNA and Cytochrome Oxidase 1) and genotyped ticks from nine Mediterranean countries. We compared genetic indices and haplotypic composition between these countries and the various French geographical populations. Results Across all countries, we showed significant genetic differentiation, with a certain proximity between neighboring countries. We found very different genetic compositions among the French geographic populations: some exhibited signs of recent expansion, while others suggested the presence of ancient populations. Conclusions It is possible that small populations of H. marginatum were already present in France and are now more abundant. This recent change in population structure could be owing to increased human activity and climate change. These factors, combined with a potentially high level of phenotypic plasticity, could facilitate H. marginatum conquest of more northerly latitudes in France and other European countries. Graphical Abstract

Soft ticks of the genus Ornithodoros are responsible for the maintenance and transmission of the African swine fever (ASF) virus in the sylvatic and domestic viral cycles in Southern Africa. They are also the main vectors of the Borrelia species causing relapsing fevers. Currently, no genetic markers are available for Afrotropical Ornithodoros ticks. As ASF spreads globally, such markers are needed to assess the role of ticks in the emergence of new outbreaks. The aim of this study is to design microsatellite markers that could be used for ticks of the Ornithodoros moubata complex, particularly Ornithodoros phacochoerus , to assess population structure and tick movements in ASF endemic areas. Methods A total of 151 markers were designed using the O. moubata and O. porcinus genomes after elimination of repeated sequences in the genomes. All designed markers were tested on O. phacochoerus and O. porcinus DNA to select the best markers. Results A total of 24 microsatellite markers were genotyped on two populations of O. phacochoerus and on individuals from four other Ornithodoros species. Nineteen markers were selected to be as robust as possible for population genetic studies on O. phacochoerus . Conclusions The microsatellite markers developed here represent the first genetic tool to study nidicolous populations of O. phacochoerus . Graphical Abstract

The genetic contribution to phenotypic variation (namely the heritability) affects the response to selection. In honeybee, the haplodiploid sex determination does not allow the straightforward use of classical quantitative genetics methods to estimate heritability and genetic correlation. Nevertheless, specific methods have been developed for about 40 years. In particular, sibling analyses are frequently used with three main methods: an historical model using the average colony relatedness, a half‐sib/full‐sib model, and the more recent animal model. We compared those three methods using experimental and simulated datasets to see which performs the best. Our experimental dataset is composed of 10 colonies with a total sample of 853 workers. All individuals were genotyped to reconstitute the pedigree, and phenotypic traits were measured: labial palpus and wing cubital veins lengths. We also simulated phenotypic datasets with varying levels of heritability, common environment effect, and genetic correlation between traits. The simulation approach showed that the average colony relatedness was highly biased in presence of common environment effect whereas the half‐sib/full‐sib and the animal model gave reliable estimates of heritability. The animal model provided the greatest precision in genetic correlations. Using this latter method, we found that wing vein lengths had high heritabilities whereas the palpus length had lower heritability due to larger environmental variance and/or measurement error. Finally, significant genetic correlations among measured traits indicate that they do not evolve independently. In honeybee, specific quantitative genetics methods have been developed to accommodate the haplodiploidy. We compare three sib‐analysis methods based on an experimental dataset of 10 colonies from two islands in the South‐West Indian Ocean and on simulated datasets.

Under environmental stress, previously hidden additive genetic variation can be unmasked and exposed to selection. The amount of hidden variation is expected to be higher for life history traits, which strongly correlate to individual fitness, than for morphological traits, in which fitness effects are more ambiguous. However, no consensual pattern has been recovered yet, and this idea is still debated in the literature. Here, we hypothesize that the classical categorization of traits (i.e., life history and morphology) may fail to capture their proximity to fitness. In the desert locust, Schistocerca gregaria, a model organism for the study of insect polyphenism, we quantified changes in additive genetic variation elicited by lifetime thermal stress for ten traits, in which evolutionary significance is known. Irrespective of their category, traits under strong stabilizing selection showed genetic invariance with environmental stress, while traits more loosely associated with fitness showed a marked increase in additive genetic variation in the stressful environment. Furthermore, traits involved in adaptive phenotypic plasticity (growth compensation) showed either no change in additive genetic variance or a change of moderate magnitude across thermal environments. We interpret this mitigated response of plastic traits in the context of integrated evolution to adjust the entire phenotype in heterogeneous environments (i.e., adaptiveness of initial plasticity, compromise of phenotypic compensation with stress, and shared developmental pathway). Altogether, our results indicate, in agreement with theoretical expectations, that environmental stress can increase available additive genetic variance in some desert locust traits, but those closely linked to fitness are largely unaffected. Our study also highlights the importance of assessing the proximity to fitness of a trait on a case‐by‐case basis and in an ecologically relevant context, as well as considering the processes of canalization and plasticity, involved in the control of phenotypic variation. The idea that environmental stress can unmask cryptic additive genetic variation and expose it to selection is well accepted. Still, no consensus has been reached on the potential magnitude of these stress‐induced changes. In the desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria), we show that ecologically relevant environmental stress increases available additive genetic variance only for traits that are not directly linked to individual fitness. Our results suggest that using a life history versus morphology categorization of traits as a proxy for their link to fitness might be too simplistic, and instead, traits' proximity to fitness should be known specifically in the studied populations. Our study also highlights that traits' control of phenotypic variation (canalization vs. plasticity) should not be overlooked.

Comparative genomic studies are revealing that, in sharp contrast with the strong stability found in birds and mammals, sex determination mechanisms are surprisingly labile in cold-blooded vertebrates, with frequent transitions between different pairs of sex chromosomes. It was recently suggested that, in context of this high turnover, some chromosome pairs might be more likely than others to be co-opted as sex chromosomes. Empirical support, however, is still very limited. Here we show that sex-linked markers from three highly divergent groups of anurans map to Xenopus tropicalis scaffold 1, a large part of which is homologous to the avian sex chromosome. Accordingly, the bird sex determination gene DMRT1, known to play a key role in sex differentiation across many animal lineages, is sex linked in all three groups. Our data provide strong support for the idea that some chromosome pairs are more likely than others to be co-opted as sex chromosomes because they harbor key genes from the sex determination pathway.

Theory predicts that positive heterozygosity-fitness correlations (HFCs) arise as a consequence of inbreeding, which is often assumed to have a strong impact in small, fragmented populations. Yet according to empirical data, HFC in such populations seem highly variable and unpredictable. We here discuss two overlooked phenomena that may contribute to this variation. First, in a small population, each generation may consist of a few families. This generates random correlations between particular alleles and fitness (AFCs, allele-fitness correlations) and results in too liberal tests for HFC. Second, in some contexts, small populations receiving immigrants may be more impacted by outbreeding depression than by inbreeding depression, resulting in negative rather than positive HFC. We investigated these processes through a case study in tadpole cohorts of Pelodytes punctatus living in small ponds. We provide evidence for a strong family structure and significant AFC in this system, as well as an example of negative HFC. By simulations, we show that this negative HFC cannot be a spurious effect of family structure, and therefore reflects outbreeding depression in the studied population. Our example suggests that a detailed examination of AFC and HFC patterns can provide valuable insights into the internal genetic structure and sources of fitness variation in small populations.

In insects, extra-molting has been viewed as a compensatory mechanism for nymphal growth that contributes to optimize body weight for successful reproduction. However, little is known on the capacity of extra-molting to evolve in natural populations, which limits our understanding of how selection acts on nymphal growth. We used a multi-generational pedigree, individual monitoring and quantitative genetics models to investigate the evolution of extra-molting and its impact on nymphal growth in a solitarious population of the desert locust, Schistocerca gregaria. Growth compensation via extra-molting was observed for 46% of the females, whose adult weight exceeded by 4% that of other females, at a cost of a 22% longer development time. We found a null heritability for body weight threshold only, and the highest and a strongly female-biased heritability for extra molting. Our genetic estimates show that (1) directional selection can act on growth rate, development time and extra-molting to optimize body weight threshold, the target of stabilizing selection, (2) extra-molting can evolve in natural populations, and (3) a genetic conflict, due to sexually antagonistic selection on extra-molting, might prevent its fixation. Finally, we discuss how antagonistic selection between solitarious and gregarious environments and/or genetic correlations between growth and phase traits might also impact the evolution of extra-molting in locusts.

We investigated the ability of European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) to respond simultaneously to the metabolic demands of specific dynamic action (SDA) and aerobic exercise and how this was influenced by moderate hypoxia (50% air saturation). At 3 h after feeding in normoxia at 20°C, SDA raised the instantaneous oxygen uptake (Mo 2) of sea bass by \\documentclass{aastex} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{bm} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{pifont} \\usepackage{stmaryrd} \\usepackage{textcomp} \\usepackage{portland,xspace} \\usepackage{amsmath,amsxtra} \\usepackage[OT2,OT1]{fontenc} \\newcommand\\cyr{ \\renewcommand\\rmdefault{wncyr} \\renewcommand\\sfdefault{wncyss} \\renewcommand\\encodingdefault{OT2} \\normalfont \\selectfont} \\DeclareTextFontCommand{\\textcyr}{\\cyr} \\pagestyle{empty} \\DeclareMathSizes{10}{9}{7}{6} \\begin{document} \\landscape $47\\% \\pm 18\\% $ \\end{document} (mean ± SEM, \\documentclass{aastex} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{bm} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{pifont} \\usepackage{stmaryrd} \\usepackage{textcomp} \\usepackage{portland,xspace} \\usepackage{amsmath,amsxtra} \\usepackage[OT2,OT1]{fontenc} \\newcommand\\cyr{ \\renewcommand\\rmdefault{wncyr} \\renewcommand\\sfdefault{wncyss} \\renewcommand\\encodingdefault{OT2} \\normalfont \\selectfont} \\DeclareTextFontCommand{\\textcyr}{\\cyr} \\pagestyle{empty} \\DeclareMathSizes{10}{9}{7}{6} \\begin{document} \\landscape $N=7$ \\end{document} ) above their standard metabolic rate (SMR) when fasted. This metabolic load was sustained throughout an incremental exercise protocol until fatigue, with a \\documentclass{aastex} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{bm} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{pifont} \\usepackage{stmaryrd} \\usepackage{textcomp} \\usepackage{portland,xspace} \\usepackage{amsmath,amsxtra} \\usepackage[OT2,OT1]{fontenc} \\newcommand\\cyr{ \\renewcommand\\rmdefault{wncyr} \\renewcommand\\sfdefault{wncyss} \\renewcommand\\encodingdefault{OT2} \\normalfont \\selectfont} \\DeclareTextFontCommand{\\textcyr}{\\cyr} \\pagestyle{empty} \\DeclareMathSizes{10}{9}{7}{6} \\begin{document} \\landscape $14\\% \\pm 3\\% $ \\end{document} increase in their maximum aerobic metabolic rate (MMR) relative to their fasted rate. Their incremental critical swimming speed (U crit) did not differ between fasted and fed states. Thus, in normoxia, the bass were able to meet the combined oxygen demands of SDA and aerobic exercise. In hypoxia, the sea bass suffered a significant decline in MMR andU critrelative to their normoxic performance. The SDA response was similar to normoxia ( \\documentclass{aastex} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{bm} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{pifont} \\usepackage{stmaryrd} \\usepackage{textcomp} \\usepackage{portland,xspace} \\usepackage{amsmath,amsxtra} \\usepackage[OT2,OT1]{fontenc} \\newcommand\\cyr{ \\renewcommand\\rmdefault{wncyr} \\renewcommand\\sfdefault{wncyss} \\renewcommand\\encodingdefault{OT2} \\normalfont \\selectfont} \\DeclareTextFontCommand{\\textcyr}{\\cyr} \\pagestyle{empty} \\DeclareMathSizes{10}{9}{7}{6} \\begin{document} \\landscape $84\\% \\pm 24\\% $ \\end{document} above fasted SMR at 3 h after feeding), but although this load was sustained at low swimming speeds, it gradually disappeared as swimming speed increased. As a result, the hypoxic sea bass exhibited no difference in their fasted versus fed MMR. HypoxicU critdid not, however, differ between fasted and fed states, indicating that the sea bass deferred their SDA to maintain exercise performance. The results demonstrate that, in normoxia, the sea bass possesses excess cardiorespiratory capacity beyond that required for maximal aerobic exercise. The excess capacity is lost when oxygen availability is limited in hypoxia, and, under these conditions, the sea bass prioritize exercise performance. Thus, environmental conditions (oxygen availability) had a significant effect on patterns of oxygen allocation in sea bass and revealed intrinsic prioritization among conflicting metabolic demands.

Tychoparthenogenesis, a form of asexual reproduction in which a small proportion of unfertilized eggs can hatch spontaneously, could be an intermediate evolutionary link in the transition from sexual to parthenogenetic reproduction. The lower fitness of tychoparthenogenetic offspring could be due to either developmental constraints or to inbreeding depression in more homozygous individuals. We tested the hypothesis that in populations where inbreeding depression has been purged, tychoparthenogenesis may be less costly. To assess this hypothesis, we compared the impact of inbreeding and parthenogenetic treatments on eight life‐history traits (five measuring inbreeding depression and three measuring inbreeding avoidance) in four laboratory populations of the desert locust, Schistocerca gregaria, with contrasted demographic histories. Overall, we found no clear relationship between the population history (illustrated by the levels of genetic diversity or inbreeding) and inbreeding depression, or between inbreeding depression and parthenogenetic capacity. First, there was a general lack of inbreeding depression in every population, except in two populations for two traits. This pattern could not be explained by the purging of inbreeding load in the studied populations. Second, we observed large differences between populations in their capacity to reproduce through tychoparthenogenesis. Only the oldest laboratory population successfully produced parthenogenetic offspring. However, the level of inbreeding depression did not explain the differences in parthenogenetic success between all studied populations. Differences in development constraints may arise driven by random and selective processes between populations. The existence of parthenogenesis is still a question in evolution because of the advantages of sexual reproduction. Species, which exhibit occasional or accidental parthenogenesis (i.e., tychoparthenogenesis), such as the desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria), provide the opportunity to directly compare sexual and parthenogenetic reproduction. However, we found no clear relationship between the level of inbreeding, inbreeding depression, and parthenogenetic capacity suggesting that others selective or random processes may have to be taken into account.