Nate's field trip

Nate was with Angling club of Tolmin for a week.

One day, two papers

BTRG had a lucky day: two papers were published on the same day.

A short paper about brown trout was published in Croatian journal. Unlike most of our research on brown trout, this paper is not about wild population. We genotyped fish from Fishing Club Bled fish farm to estimate the level of introgression of non native (Atlantic) genetic markers into native (Danubian) brown trout. Introgression was higher in females, probably because survival rate of males in captivity is lower therefore new males are routinely transferred from the wild where introgression is lower.

The second paper is about huchen, an endangered salmonid that matures at 65-70 cm of length and is endemic to the Danube basin. Unlike the highly diverse brown trout, huchen has low genetic variability so even fish from distant locations are genetically very similar. Based on observed markers, samples from 6 countries can be placed into two clusters: Austria / Slovenia and Ukraine / Slovakia / Montenegro / Bosnia-Herzegovina.

There are several possible explanations for low diversity within the species: (1) a slow molecular clock - essentially slow evolution; (2) low historical effective population sizes - small number of "breeders" in the entire basin; (3) a speciation founder effect - all living huchens are descendants of a very small number of ancestral huchens; (4) more recent human-caused bottlenecks - caused by overfishing and habitat degradation.

ICSB

Anja and Aleš attended the 20th International Conference on Subterranean Biology (ICSB), from 29 August to 3 September, held in Postojna, Slovenia. Postojna cave was named "cradle of speleobiology" after the discovery of the first subterranean life (cave beetle Leptodirus hochenwartii Schmidt, 1832). Anja's contribution was a description of subterranean migration of imotska gaovica Delminichthys adspersus based on genetic evidence.

The conference was very interesting and excellently organized, it was really exciting to be a part of the underground scientific community for a while.

Introducing Nate

Nate Cathcart is a student from the Colorado State University taking a semester off to learn methods of fish population genetics before graduating in May 2011. During his five month stay in BTRG lab he will investigate origins of rainbow trout populations in Slovenia using historical and genetic data. Besides studying fish and growing his mullet, he enjoys ice-fishing and fly-fishing.

Morocco 2010

In June we organized another field trip to Morocco. Although without our Moroccan colleagues, we did it in a frame of common project initiated in 2006. The main idea was to sample fish in the area of Tangier which appeared to be, as suggested by our preliminary results, a crucial location for untangling colonization patterns of trout in North Africa. In order to assure success the old team was joined by Gašper (our Crocodile hunter). Massive excavation works taking place all over the potentially interesting sampling sites along with our unfamiliarity with the area were probably responsible for complete failure. Some pictures of more successful part of this trip are presented below, all pictures were taken by Johannes Schöffmann.

Integrating ecology and evolution in diversity research (Workshop)

In May Gašper attended workshop about ecology end evolution which was held in Konnevesi Research Station in Finland, organized by Centre of Excellence in Evolutionary Research, Department of Biological and Environmental Science, University of Jyväskylä, and was funded by the EU Marie Curie Initial Training Network Speciation.

Particular focus was on the genetics of adaptation and on using phylogenetic methods for studying divergence and diversification. The lectures, computer-based problem solving and a workshop on complementary skills were held by Rodolfo Costa (University of Padova), David Doležel (Biology Centre ASCR), Lacey Knowles (University of Michigan), Albert Phillimore (Imperial College London), and Johanna Mappes (University of Jyväskylä).

The knowledge of phylogenetic methods will help Gašper to resolve the origin of marble trout.

Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition.

-Adam Smith (The Wealth of Nations, 1776)

PAG Conference XVIII in San Diego

In January, 2010, Urška and Aleš attended Plant and Animal Genome Conference XVIII in San Diego, California, where they presented a poster entitled “SEARCHING FOR CANDIDATE GENES RESPONSIBLE FOR SKIN COLOURATION IN Salmo sp. USING MICROARRAYS”.

Aleš has been haunted ever since by next generation sequencing and thinking about what is better: first ask questions and then do the sequencing or vice versa?

After the conference, they stayed a couple of days in San Diego enjoying ocean scene, Hillcrest and the Zoo. Urška was afraid of Mexican gang fights (and food) so they just skipped Baja California and resumed the journey to Death Valley and Las Vegas. What an alternative. Picture gallery available here.