Genomic screening to identify food trees potentially dispersed by precolonial Indigenous peoples

Monica Fahey, Maurizio Rossetto*, Emilie Ens, Andrew Ford

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

8 Citations (Scopus)
62 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Over millennia, Indigenous peoples have dispersed the propagules of non-crop plants through trade, seasonal migration or attending ceremonies; and potentially increased the geographic range or abundance of many food species around the world. Genomic data can be used to reconstruct these histories. However, it can be difficult to disentangle anthropogenic from non-anthropogenic dispersal in long-lived non-crop species. We developed a genomic workflow that can be used to screen out species that show patterns consistent with faunal dispersal or long-term isolation, and identify species that carry dispersal signals of putative human influence. We used genotyping-by-sequencing (DArTseq) and whole-plastid sequencing (SKIMseq) to identify nuclear and chloroplast Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms in east Australian rainforest trees (4 families, 7 genera, 15 species) with large (>30 mm) or small (<30 mm) edible fruit, either with or without a known history of use by Indigenous peoples. We employed standard population genetic analyses to test for four signals of dispersal using a limited and opportunistically acquired sample scheme. We expected different patterns for species that fall into one of three broadly described dispersal histories: (1) ongoing faunal dispersal, (2) post-megafauna isolation and (3) post-megafauna isolation followed by dispersal of putative human influence. We identified five large-fruited species that displayed strong population structure combined with signals of dispersal. We propose coalescent methods to investigate whether these genomic signals can be attributed to post-megafauna isolation and dispersal by Indigenous peoples.

Original languageEnglish
Article number476
Pages (from-to)1-36
Number of pages36
JournalGenes
Volume13
Issue number3
Early online date8 Mar 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Mar 2022

Bibliographical note

Copyright the Author(s) 2022. Version archived for private and non-commercial use with the permission of the author/s and according to publisher conditions. For further rights please contact the publisher.

Keywords

  • Anthropogenic dispersal
  • Chloroplast genome
  • Ethnobotany
  • Fruit size
  • Genomic screening
  • Indigenous
  • Insipient domestication
  • Non-crop species
  • Propagule dispersal
  • Rainforest assembly

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