Genetic Diversity and Evolutionary Potential: Impacts of Habitat Fragmentation
A special issue of Diversity (ISSN 1424-2818). This special issue belongs to the section "Biogeography and Macroecology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 1 March 2025 | Viewed by 99
Special Issue Editor
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Genetic diversity determines evolutionary potential. Without a variable genome, natural selection cannot occur. Habitat fragmentation is the single largest threat to global biodiversity as it reduces or eliminates gene flow among populations, thereby increasing the erosion of genetic diversity through the process of random genetic drift. The loss of adaptive capacity due to drift in small isolated populations is irreversible without gene flow and ensuing genetic rescue. Additionally without habitat connectivity, populations cannot expand or contract into refugia, which is increasingly important under climate change. The synergism between climate change and habitat fragmentation will send many species into an extinction vortex. This Special Issue will provide a deep dive into the effects of anthropogenic habitat fragmentation on movement patterns, population genetic structure and the maintenance of genetic variation using examples from a diversity of organisms across the globe. We seek to profile species, ecosystems, and ecoregions most impacted by habitat fragmentation, as well as where global climate change is likely to accelerate the loss of biodiversity.
Prof. Dr. Mary M. Peacock
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- habitat fragmentation
- habitat connectivity
- gene flow
- dispersal
- evolutionary potential
- adaptive capacity
- random genetic drift
- genetic rescue
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