Abstract
Mimetic Butterflies Introgress to Impress
Highlights
The Neotropical genus Heliconius is a diverse clade of brightly colored and chemically defended butterflies
Rapid evolution of wing pattern diversity in Heliconius, combined with convergence due to mimicry, has resulted in a group of closely related and hybridizing species, some of which look very different and others that look nearly identical. These two new papers show that alleles for wing patterning have moved across species boundaries multiple times, effectively transferring mimicry from one species to another
This discovery of adaptive introgression in Heliconius builds upon five important prior advances
Summary
The Neotropical genus Heliconius is a diverse clade of brightly colored and chemically defended butterflies. This group is well-known for mimicry, in which different species evolve nearly identical wing patterns as a means of protection from predators [8]. Rapid evolution of wing pattern diversity in Heliconius, combined with convergence due to mimicry, has resulted in a group of closely related and hybridizing species, some of which look very different and others that look nearly identical.
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