Pushing the envelope in genetic analysis of species invasion.

Abstract

How a species spreads once introduced into a new environment is a major question in landscape genetics. When the species in question is a potential disease vector, the findings are important not only for fundamental science, but can impact applied science and public health as well. In this issue of Molecular Ecology Medley et al. (2014) study, the invasion patterns of the Asian tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus), which is thought to have been introduced in Houston, Texas in the 1980s and can be a vector for human disease including dengue fever, West Nile virus, yellow fever, encephalomeylitis and the Chikungunya virus. This topic is at the extreme cutting edge of landscape genetics. By combining multiple scales of analysis within a rangewide study of genetic differentiation of an invasive species, Medley et al. (2014) undertake a truly ambitious analysis that pushes the envelope in methodology and scope of inference in the study of the genetics of range expansion.