Human-aided and natural dispersal drive gene flow across the range of an invasive mosquito

    Authors

    K. A. Medley; D. G. Jenkins;E. A. Hoffman

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    Abbreviated Journal Title

    Mol. Ecol.

    Keywords

    Ae; albopictus; chikungunya; disease vector; exotic species; landscape; genetics; AEDES-ALBOPICTUS SKUSE; LANDSCAPE GENETICS; UNITED-STATES; AGRICULTURAL; LANDSCAPE; TIGER MOSQUITO; CIRCUIT-THEORY; POPULATIONS; ECOLOGY; CONNECTIVITY; CULICIDAE; Biochemistry & Molecular Biology; Ecology; Evolutionary Biology

    Abstract

    Human-aided transport is responsible for many contemporary species introductions, yet the contribution of human-aided transport to dispersal within non-native regions is less clear. Understanding dispersal dynamics for invasive species can streamline mitigation efforts by targeting routes that contribute disproportionally to spread. Because of its limited natural dispersal ability, rapid spread of the Asian tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) has been attributed to human-aided transport, but until now, the relative roles of human-aided and natural movement have not been rigorously evaluated. Here, we use landscape genetics and information-theoretic model selection to evaluate 52 models representing 9240 pairwise dispersal paths among sites across the US range for Ae.albopictus and show that recent gene flow reflects a combination of natural and human-aided dispersal. Highways and water availability facilitate dispersal at a broad spatial scale, but gene flow is hindered by forests at the current distributional limit (range edge) and by agriculture among sites within the mosquito's native climatic niche (range core). Our results show that highways are important to genetic structure between range-edge and range-core pairs, suggesting a role for human-aided mosquito transport to the range edge. In contrast, natural dispersal is dominant at smaller spatial scales, reflecting a shifting dominance to natural movement two decades after introduction. These conclusions highlight the importance of (i) early intervention for species introductions, particularly those with readily dispersed dormant stages and short generation times, and (ii) strict monitoring of commercial shipments for transported immature stages of Ae.albopictus, particularly towards the northern edge of the US range.

    Journal Title

    Molecular Ecology

    Volume

    24

    Issue/Number

    2

    Publication Date

    1-1-2015

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    284

    Last Page

    295

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000348061600003

    ISSN

    0962-1083

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