Revisiting an Old Riddle: What Determines Genetic Diversity Levels within Species?

2012/09/11 by Ellen M. Leffler, Kevin Bullaughey, Daniel R. Matute +5 · 2 citations
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Environmental Science · #Genetic diversity and population structure #Species Distribution and Climate Change #Evolution and Genetic Dynamics

paper · pdf · doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001388

openalex publication_date 2012/09/11 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04

Abstract

Understanding why some species have more genetic diversity than others is central to the study of ecology and evolution, and carries potentially important implications for conservation biology. Yet not only does this question remain unresolved, it has largely fallen into disregard. With the rapid decrease in sequencing costs, we argue that it is time to revive it.

Citations

• Effective population size and patterns of molecular evolution and variation
• Evolutionary Rate at the Molecular Level
• Slightly Deleterious Mutant Substitutions in Evolution
• The Neutral Theory of Molecular Evolution
• Evolution of the mutation rate
• The neutral theory is dead. Long live the neutral theory
• The genetics of inbreeding depression
• Inference of human population history from individual whole-genome sequences
• The hitch-hiking effect of a favourable gene
• The genomic rate of adaptive evolution
• The effect of linkage on limits to artificial selection
• IS THE POPULATION SIZE OF A SPECIES RELEVANT TO ITS EVOLUTION?
• The hitch-hiking effect of a favourable gene

Cited by

• Natural selection shaped the rise and fall of passenger pigeon genomic diversity
• Passenger pigeon [wikipedia]