Using data from 83 isolates from a single population, the population genomics of the microcrustacean Daphnia pulex are described and compared to current knowledge for the only other well-studied invertebrate, Drosophila melanogaster These two species are quite similar with respect to effective population sizes and mutation rates, although some features of recombination appear to be different, w...

Inducible, anti-predator traits are a classic example of phenotypic plasticity. Their evolutionary dynamics depend on their genetic basis, the historical pattern of predation risk that populations have experienced and current selection gradients. When populations experience predators with contrasting hunting strategies and size preferences, theory suggests contrasting micro-evolutionary respons...

1. The Daphnia pulex-pulicaria species complex has been proposed as an example of rapid ecological speciation, associated with divergence along the gradient of waterbody size from temporary ponds to deep, stratified lakes. However, this divergence is incomplete, and thus represents an opportunity to study ecological divergence as it is occurring. 2. Dynamics of twelve populations of Daphnia in ...

When individuals from multiple populations colonize a new habitat patch, intraspecific trait variation can make the arrival order of colonists an important factor for subsequent population and community dynamics. In particular, intraspecific priority effects (IPEs) allow early arrivers to limit the growth or establishment of later arrivers, even when competitively inferior on a per-capita basis...

Ovaries were taken from five sexually mature amphipods: Gammarus fossarum, Gammarus pulex, Gammarus roeseli, Hyallela azteca and Parhyale hawaiensis. The soluble proteome extracted from individual pair of ovaries from five biological replicates was trypsin digested and the resulting peptides were analyzed by high resolution tandem mass spectrometry. The spectra were assigned with four protein s...

considering the crucial importance of daphnia species in aquaculture, in particular for artificially- cultured sturgeon fry, a comprehensive study on the hatching requirements of their diapausing eggs seemed to be inevitable in order to obtain the ideal hatching technique. to do so, the ephippial eggs were collected from live food ponds in the cultivation and breeding centre of gorgan and after...

Maturation is a critical developmental process, and the age and size at which it occurs have important fitness consequences. Although maturation is remarkably variable, certain mechanisms, including a minimum size or state threshold, are proposed to underlie the process across a broad diversity of taxa. Recent evidence suggests that thresholds may themselves be developmentally plastic, and in t...

Improvements in sequencing technology over the past 5 years are leading to routine application of shotgun sequencing in the fields of ecology and evolution. However, the theory to estimate evolutionary parameters from these data is still being worked out. Here we present an extension and implementation of part of this theory, mlRho. This program can efficiently compute the following three maxim...