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SUMMARY:Journal Club - John Welch - John Welch (University of Cambridge)
DTSTART:20111117T130000Z
DTEND:20111117T140000Z
UID:TALK34451@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Simon Baxter
DESCRIPTION:Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) is a globally ubiquitous f
 ungal infection that has emerged to become a primary driver of amphibian b
 iodiversity loss. Despite widespread effort to understand the emergence of
  this panzootic\, the origins of the infection\, its patterns of global sp
 read\, and principle mode of evolution remain largely unknown. Using compa
 rative population genomics\, we discovered three deeply diverged lineages 
 of Bd associated with amphibians. Two of these lineages were found in mult
 iple continents and are associated with known introductions by the amphibi
 an trade. We found that isolates belonging to one clade\, the global panzo
 otic lineage (BdGPL) have emerged across at least five continents during t
 he 20th century and are associated with the onset of epizootics in North A
 merica\, Central America\, the Caribbean\, Australia\, and Europe. The two
  newly identified divergent lineages\, Cape lineage (BdCAPE) and Swiss lin
 eage (BdCH)\, were found to differ in morphological traits when compared a
 gainst one another and BdGPL\, and we show that BdGPL is hypervirulent. Bd
 GPL uniquely bears the hallmarks of genomic recombination\, manifested as 
 extensive intergenomic phylogenetic conflict and patchily distributed hete
 rozygosity. We postulate that contact between previously genetically isola
 ted allopatric populations of Bd may have allowed recombination to occur\,
  resulting in the generation\, spread\, and invasion of the hypervirulent 
 BdGPL leading to contemporary disease-driven losses in amphibian biodivers
 ity.\n
LOCATION:Basement Seminar Room\, Department of Zoology
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