Abstract
By studying invasive species, evolutionary geneticists have been able to
simultaneously inform management strategies and quantify rapid evolution
in the wild. The role of genomics in invasion science is increasingly
recognised, and the growing availability of reference genomes for
invasive species is paving the way for whole-genome resequencing studies
in a wide range of systems. Here, we survey the literature to assess the
application of whole-genome resequencing data in invasion biology. For
some applications, such as the reconstruction of invasion routes in time
and space, sequencing the whole genome of many individuals simply
increases the accuracy of existing methods. In other cases, population
genomic approaches such as haplotype analysis can permit entirely new
questions to be addressed and new technologies to be applied. To date
whole-genome resequencing has only been applied to a handful of invasive
systems, but these studies have highlighted important roles for
processes such as balancing selection and hybridization that allow
invasive species to reuse existing adaptations and rapidly overcome the
challenges of a foreign ecosystem. The use of genomic data does not
constitute a paradigm shift per se, but by leveraging new theory,
tools, and technologies, population genomics can provide unprecedented
insight into basic and applied aspects of invasion science.