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Coral reefs are suffering a major decline due to the environmental constraints imposed by climate change. Over the last 20 years, three major coral bleaching events occurred in concomitance of anomalous heat waves, provoking a severe loss of coral cover world-wide. Recent works, however, reported of reefs at which recurrent bleaching events resulted in reduced sensitivity to thermal stresses. Adaptation has been suggested to be responsible for this phenomenon. The conservation strategies for preserving the reefs, as they are conceived now, can not cope with global climatic shifts. In this regard, researchers advocated the set-up of a preservation framework to reinforce coral adaptive potential. The main obstacle to this approach is that studies focusing on coral adaptation usually concern a couple of contrasted reefs and their results are therefore hard to generalize at the scale of a reef system. In this work, we ran a seascape genomics analysis to study adaptation of a flagship coral species of the Ryukyu Archipelago (Japan). By associating genotype frequencies with descriptors of historical environmental conditions, we discovered six polymorphisms that might elicit resistance against thermal stress and calculated the probability of presence of these putative adaptive traits across the whole study area. Furthermore, the seascape genomics method allowed us to calculate a connectivity model based on sea surface currents and calibrated on genetic data. These results were used to compute, for every reef of the Ryukyu Archipelago, indexes describing corals adaptive and connective potential. This information can be extremely useful for preservation, since it provides an objective information on how the adaptive potential distributes and disperse across the reef system. Finally, we provide two examples of how this information can be implemented in conservation strategies commonly used such as the establishment of marine protected areas and coral nurseries. Together, the results of our work advocate the value of genetic analyses for empowering preservation efforts dedicated to the protection of coral reef from warming oceans.

AdaptMap consortium., [Background]: Since goat was domesticated 10,000 years ago, many factors have contributed to the differentiation of goat breeds and these are classified mainly into two types: (i) adaptation to different breeding systems and/or purposes and (ii) adaptation to different environments. As a result, approximately 600 goat breeds have developed worldwide; they differ considerably from one another in terms of phenotypic characteristics and are adapted to a wide range of climatic conditions. In this work, we analyzed the AdaptMap goat dataset, which is composed of data from more than 3000 animals collected worldwide and genotyped with the CaprineSNP50 BeadChip. These animals were partitioned into groups based on geographical area, production uses, available records on solid coat color and environmental variables including the sampling geographical coordinates, to investigate the role of natural and/or artificial selection in shaping the genome of goat breeds., [Results]: Several signatures of selection on different chromosomal regions were detected across the different breeds, sub-geographical clusters, phenotypic and climatic groups. These regions contain genes that are involved in important biological processes, such as milk-, meat- or fiber-related production, coat color, glucose pathway, oxidative stress response, size, and circadian clock differences. Our results confirm previous findings in other species on adaptation to extreme environments and human purposes and provide new genes that could explain some of the differences between goat breeds according to their geographical distribution and adaptation to different environments., [Conclusions]: These analyses of signatures of selection provide a comprehensive first picture of the global domestication process and adaptation of goat breeds and highlight possible genes that may have contributed to the differentiation of this species worldwide., Authors are grateful to all breeders and AdaptMap members who provided data to the initiative (http://www.goatadaptmap.org/) that are described in Stella et al.. The authors from the University of Milan are grateful to Stefano Frattini who was supported by the GenHome project, for supporting coordinating meetings. Support for Francesca Bertolini was provided by State of Iowa, hatch and Ensminger funds. Financial support provided in part by the Illumina Greater Good grant is appreciated.

In a simulation study of genotypes conducted over 100 generations for more than 1600 butterfly’s individuals, we evaluate how the increase of anthropogenic fragmentation and reduction of habitat size along urbanisation gradients (from 7% to 59% of impervious land cover) influences genetic diversity and population persistence in butterfly species. We show that in areas characterised by a high urbanisation rate (> 56% impervious land cover), a large decrease of both genetic diversity (loss of 60-80% of initial observed heterozygosity) and population size (loss of 70-90% of individuals) is observed over time. This is confirmed by empirical data available for the mobile butterfly species Pieris rapae in a sub-part of the study area. Comparing simulated data for P. rapae with its normal dispersal ability and with a reduced dispersal ability, we also show that a higher dispersal ability can be an advantage to survive in an urban or highly fragmented environment. The results obtained here suggest that it is of high importance to account for population persistence, and confirm that it is crucial to maintain habitat size and connectivity in the context of land-use planning.

Potassium (K) is a crucial element for plant nutrition and its availability and spatial distribution in agricultural soils is influenced by many agro-environmental factors. In Switzerland, a soil monitoring network (FRIBO) was established in 1987 with 250 sites distributed over the whole of the canton of Fribourg (representing 4% of the surface area of Switzerland), whose territory is shared between the Swiss Midlands and the Western Alp foothills. In this study area, diverse geological deposits (sandstone, marlstone, silts and calcareous rocks), soil types (Cambisols, Gleysols, Rendzinas, Luvisols and Fluvisols) and land uses (cropland, permanent grassland and mountain pasture) are present, making the network interesting for assessing the relative contribution of environmental variables and land use management on soil properties. The aims of the present study were to (i) characterize the soil K status in the Fribourg canton according to four different extraction methods; (ii) analyse the spatial variability of soil K in relation to land use, soil type, soil parent material and topography; (iii) evaluate the spatial predictability of K at the canton level; and (iv) analyse the implications for K fertilization management. The overall amount of soil total K averaged 13.6 g·kg − 1 with significant variations across the sites (5.1–22.1 g·kg − 1 ). The spatial distribution of total K content was influenced by relatively extended soil forming processes, as suggested by (i) a significant global spatial autocorrelation measure at the 10 km scale (Moran's I = 0.43); (ii) significant differences observed among soil types and soil parent materials and (iii) significant correlations with land attributes such as elevation ( r = − 0.51). On the other hand, available mean K forms were significantly different among land uses, with the highest mean values of available K encountered in permanent grasslands, from 46.3 mg·kg − 1 (water extraction) to 198 mg·kg − 1 (acetate ammonium + EDTA extraction). All K forms (total and available) showed similar spatial regional patterns for all spatial interpolation methods, with areas dominated by permanent grassland and crops presenting higher values. However, these trends were less pronounced for the available K forms due to the prevalence of on-farm management practices for these K forms ( e.g. fertilization), likely inducing high spatial and temporal variability. This hypothesis was supported by spatial clustering of low and/or high K fertility status that could be related to local particular farming practices. Grasslands require particular attention with regard to overall high K fertility status.

International audience; We introduce a new method to detect signatures of natural selection in the genome based on the application of spatial analysis, with the contribution of Geographical Information Systems, environmental variables, molecular data, and multiple univariate logistic regressions. Its use allows the identification of the same genomic regions as revealed by a theoretical approach in population genomics, but also the uncovering of environmental parameters responsible for selection which was so far difficult. This research also opens up avenues for GISciences research in molecular ecology.

International audience; This communication presents the last development on the Symbology Encoding and the Web Processing Services standards, implemented in the OrbisGIS platform. Use cases are discussed during a practical session.