Meeting Abstract
The molecular mechanisms by which organisms adapt to their environments have long been sought to fully understand fundamental processes pertaining to organismal biology, ecology, and evolution. Animals that inhabit subterranean environments often undergo various distinct physiological, morphological, and behavioral modifications (referred to as “troglomorphy”) as they transition to life in perpetual darkness. However, the molecular basis behind these troglomorphic changes in subterranean populations remains poorly understood. Important questions remain to be answered concerning the mechanisms involved in the loss of traits at the transcriptomic level, and the role of epigenetic modifications in driving evolution in these systems. In this study we investigate the transcriptional and epigenetic basis behind the reduction of vision in natural populations of cave crustaceans using a combined DNA methylation and RNA sequencing approach. To do so, we employ comparative phylogenetic, transcriptomic, and epigenetic methods on surface and cave-adapted natural populations of an emerging model cave species, the isopod Asellus aquaticus, and the amphipod Niphargus hrabei. By sequencing and assembling robust de novo transcriptomes and methylomes, we identified and characterized differentially methylated and expressed genes and pathways between surface and cave populations of the aforementioned species. With such, we aim to provide a solid bridge between genotype-phenotype, and improve our understanding of patterns of molecular evolution in extreme environments and their role in analogous systems.
