F. W. Allendorf and G. Luikart, Conserving Global Biodiversity? Conservation and the Genetics of Populations

Abstract

Conservation and the Genetics of Populations is the second major text that deals with the relatively young discipline of Conservation Genetics, with publication arriving some five years after that of the field's inaugural text (Frankham et al. 2002). The discipline has not been without contro- versy, with continuing debate among those who implement conservation strategy as to how important genetic consid- erations are likely to be, particularly in the short term. While the authors acknowledge this debate, they do not dwell on it, pointing out that the book's aim is to provide an understanding of the principles of conservation genetics, and ways of applying them in real-world situations; it is not an argument for the value of genetics to conservation per se. Having fairly recently completed the (seemingly) never-ending undergrad and graduate route myself, this text would have been very welcome during that time, as it provides a truly comprehensive and accessible guide to the discipline. The target audience of the book is advanced under- graduate and graduate students, conservation biologists and practitioners. The book presents well, with very good illustrations, a 'guest box' in each chapter authored by leading workers in the field (e.g., Louis Bernatchez, James Crow, Loren Rieseberg, Robert Vrijenhoek, Robin Waples, and 22 others), and problem sets at the end of each chapter. Each chapter opens with a couple of relevant quotations, many from 'giants' in the field—a nice touch (for the mathematically-challenged, see Dobzhansky's remarks on Sewall Wright's work in the Appendix). Case studies provide a good mix of both classical and recent advances in conservation genetics. An associated website provides solutions to the problems (in printable PDF format), alongside example data sets and several basic software programs to illustrate methods of data analysis and popu- lation genetic processes (e.g., Hardy-Weinberg test). The book comprises 20 chapters divided into three sections. The first, the Introduction, opens with a brief 'what and how', that is, what should we conserve and how are we going to go about doing so. Subsequent chapters in this section deal with variation in natural populations, both phenotypic and genetic, and the assessment and application thereof in conservation; with genetic variation being fur- ther subdivided into two chapters, the first on chromosomal and protein variation, the second on DNA variation. This provides a good background to the discipline and an overview of the tools of the trade, and how to apply them appropriately. The chapter on DNA variation concludes with a short overview of recent developments that could potentially revolutionise the field, such as population genomics and DNA arrays. However, one other develop- ment that may well contribute significantly to conservation genetics and population genetic theory in general, the growing field of 'ancient DNA' (e.g., to understand the significance of changes in gene frequencies over time), is not covered at all in this book. Part II deals with Mechanisms of Evolutionary Change and provides much of the theoretical genetics background to the more applied final section of the book. This section provides comprehensive chapters on Hardy-Weinberg, Small populations and genetic drift, Effective population size, Natural selection, Population subdivision, Multiple loci, Quantitative genetics, and Mutation. The first three chapters get to the heart of the problem—the loss of genetic