Indirect methods for monitoring and modeling gene flow in natural plant populations

Abstract

Gene flow is a microevolutionary process that maintain the allelic exchange among local populations increasing population genetic diversity. Because of the immobility of plants, pollen plays a major role in connecting extant populations while seeds are necessary to establish and maintain populations of plants.Despite the widespread use of next-generation sequencing platforms, codominant molecular markers, such as microsatellites are still useful and informative tools in molecular ecology and conservation genetic studies. These markers are currently the most-frequently-used tools for population genetic studies in plants. These molecular markers reveal information for gene flow estimation by indirect methods and also for comparing the role of gene flow by pollen versus gene flow by seed in the determination of population genetic structures. Approximate Bayesian computation methods are often used to determine the most probable model of genetic admixture among populations.