Assessing the evolutionary potential of small populations of an endangered rattlesnake in multi-copy gene families
An important goal of conservation genetics is to assess whether endangered species have reduced evolutionary potential caused by the loss of adaptive variation and reduced efficiency of selection owing to drift. A novel approach to evaluate adaptive potential that integrates across these mechanisms is to conduct genome-scale selection analyses of genomic regions containing genes of known ecological importance. We compare summary statistics in presumably neutral control regions with focal adaptive regions of known ecological importance: the Major Histocompatibility Complex and venom regions. We apply selection tests applicable to multiple timescales within and among endangered eastern massasauga (Sisturus catenatus) populations with different effective sizes, and to an outbred sister species, S. tergeminus, with larger contemporary and coalescent effective sizes.