Department of Entomology

Title: “Genetics, development, and evolution of mimetic color diversity in bumble bees."

Abstract: Adaptive mimetic diversifications provide ample phenotypic diversity and convergence ideal for understanding how microevolutionary processes translate to macroevolutionary variation, and how the genome is targeted under selection. My lab is advancing a new system for understanding these processes in studying the genetics and evolution of mimetic coloration in the highly color diverse bumble bees. We have used bioinformatic and genomic tools (GWAS) to narrow a locus driving mimetic coloration in one bumble bee species to a major segmental homeotic gene. We are employing a diversity of developmental genetic tools to investigate how changes in such developmentally conserved genes translate to segmental color variation. With this locus in hand, we examine whether these same changes are implicated in numerous comimetic species, testing whether sorting of ancestral polymorphisms, parallel mechanisms, or genetically novel mechanisms drive mimetic convergence. This research provides new insights into how the genome is modified to generate adaptive diversity, while also revealing how major developmental homeotic genes modify segmental phenotypes.