A central goal of evolutionary biology is to understand the ways in which species become reproductively isolated from one another. One powerful approach to this problem involves the study of naturally occurring hybrid populations. In particular, inferences about the genetics of reproductive isolation can be made through the study of differential movement of genes across a hybrid zone between two species. Genes contributing to reproductive isolation are expected to move less freely across a hybrid zone than genes that do not contribute to reproductive isolation. The primary objective of the proposed research is to assess the number and relative contribution of genes to reproductive isolation between two European house mouse species, Mus musculus and M. domesticus, that naturally hybridize in central Europe. Approximately 900 mice from two transects across this hybrid zone in Germany will be genotyped for 68 genetic markers of known chromosomal location and a statistical analysis of the relative movement of these markers across the zone will be made.
Because the complete sequence of the mouse genome will be available soon, this research will lay the groundwork for identifying specific genes involved in reproductive isolation. The study is both significant and unique in its utilization of a vast amount of genetic information to address a fundamental problem in biology, that is, the genetic basis of speciation.
