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With permeable species boundaries and multi-species synchronized mass spawning events, reef corals represent an animal taxon unparalleled for its potential for interspecific hybridization. Furthermore, the available data provide evidence that genetic introgression between closely related coral species is common over evolutionary time scales. Yet in the face of genetic exchange between species, distinct morphologies and ecological specializations are maintained across large sympatric distributions. My research is focused on understanding the degree and nature of genetic exchange between coral species at the genomic level, the importance of this exchange for the population dynamics of reef corals and the genetic mechanism for the maintenance of distinct coral species. Thus far, this includes the utilization of high-density oligonucleotide arrays to discover regions of the coral genome that are not introgressing between two highly cross-fertile Indo-Pacific coral species, Acropora millepora and A. pulchra. These represent potential genomic regions responsible for the differences we see between the two species. |
