Advanced Topics of Population and Evolution Genetics in Forest Trees

Dear Colleagues,

To say that forest trees are important today for their ecological resources, services, and in general for biodiversity is a truism. The current technologies for genomic analysis allow us unprecedented insight into the evolution of forest trees and have opened new avenues for research. Among these, one could cite the possibility to study in detail genetic adaptation (and phenotypic plasticity) and evolutionary modeling based on the assessment of thousands of genotypes and for a variety of ecological data.

The most fascinating possible outcome is, in my opinion, the ability to bring together population genetics and quantitative genetics again to deepen our understanding of evolutionary processes. For example, the assessment of genetic variation in response to local ecological conditions could be a useful starting tool to determine adaptive variation in natural stands. This has already been done, but with emphasis on a small proportion of genomes only. Big data analysis will provide us with whole-genome-level information. This information will be relative to neutral genetic diversity (population history), signatures of selection, and estimates of recombination rates among different genomic regions, thus helping to determine the levels of linkage disequilibrium needed for QTL studies, variation in chromosome structure, and so on. Additionally, knowledge around genetic adaptive traits will support actions in forest management and conservation.

The main field of application of this kind of studies will probably be GCC, because information on the relationship between genetic variation and environmental variation is necessary to implement bioclimatic models to simulate how the present genetic variation will be shaped by a changing environment and to identify the current and projected distribution of forest species. This aspect will also benefit from the validation of genetic and phenotypic associations under controlled environments.

The information obtained from different approaches can lead to the identification of genotypes adapted to future climatic conditions, to select seed sources and populations for planning sound conservation strategies such as assisted migration or assisted range expansion, to help forest tree species to cope with fast-changing climatic conditions and prevent localized declines.

However, to be able to tap into this almost infinite source of information, genetic, phenotypic, and ecological life scientists also need to understand and exploit data and information from genomic, proteomic, and phenotypic datasets that are increasingly growing in size. Among these, paramount will be the attention devoted to computational methods—algorithms and data structures—for analyzing DNA sequencing data, SNP genotyping, epigenetic patterns and so on, and to mathematical modeling, especially Bayesian, applied to evolutionary and ecological issues.

Interest in forest trees is growing today, also because of their importance in the face of imminent climate changes; because of this, this Special Issue devoted to “Advanced Issues in Population and Evolution Genetics in Forest Trees” will be of interest to many of us.

Prof. Giorgio Binelli
Guest Editor

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• forest genetics
• genetic structure
• climate change
• adaptive variation
• local adaptation
• landscape genetics
• candidate genes
• genome–environment association
• coalescent modeling
• approximate Bayesian computation
• population genomics
• landscape genomics
• forest ecology
• biogeography
• data science
• statistics