title: Connectivity of Caribbean coral populations: complementary insights from empirical and modelled gene flow.
abstract: Understanding patterns of connectivity among populations of marine organisms is essential for the development of realistic, spatially explicit models of population dynamics. Two approaches, empirical genetic patterns and oceanographic dispersal modelling, have been used to estimate levels of evolutionary connectivity among marine populations but rarely have their potentially complementary insights been combined. Here, a spatially realistic Lagrangian model of larval dispersal and a theoretical genetic model are integrated with the most extensive study of gene flow in a Caribbean marine organism. The 871 genets collected from 26 sites spread over the wider Caribbean subsampled 45.8% of the 1900 potential unique genets in the model. At a coarse scale, significant consensus between modelled estimates of genetic structure and empirical genetic data for populations of the reef-building coral Montastraea annularis is observed. However, modelled and empirical data differ in their estimates of connectivity among northern Mesoamerican reefs indicating that processes other than dispersal may dominate here. Further, the geographic location and porosity of the previously described east-west barrier to gene flow in the Caribbean is refined. A multi-prong approach, integrating genetic data and spatially realistic models of larval dispersal and genetic projection, provides complementary insights into the processes underpinning population connectivity in marine invertebrates on evolutionary timescales.
authors.affiliation: Marine Spatial Ecology Lab, School of Biosciences, University of Exeter, Prince of Wales Road, Exeter, UK.
authors.forename: Nicola L
authors.initials: NL
authors.lastname: Foster
authors.forename: Claire B
authors.initials: CB
authors.lastname: Paris
authors.forename: Johnathan T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Kool
authors.forename: Iliana B
authors.initials: IB
authors.lastname: Baums
authors.forename: Jamie R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Stevens
authors.forename: Juan A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Sanchez
authors.forename: Carolina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bastidas
authors.forename: Claudia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Agudelo
authors.forename: Phillippe
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Bush
authors.forename: Owen
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Day
authors.forename: Renata
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Ferrari
authors.forename: Patricia
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gonzalez
authors.forename: Shannon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gore
authors.forename: Reia
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Guppy
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: McCartney
authors.forename: Croy
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: McCoy
authors.forename: Judith
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mendes
authors.forename: Ashwanth
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Srinivasan
authors.forename: Sascha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Steiner
authors.forename: Mark J A
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Vermeij
authors.forename: Ernesto
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Weil
authors.forename: Peter J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Mumby
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D037421:Anthozoa / Q000235:genetics*; D017691:Caribbean Region; D051456:Gene Flow; D005828:Genetics, Population; D005843:Geography; D008954:Models, Biological; D008957:Models, Genetic