AGA President’s Symposium 2011: The Application of Genomics to Biodiversity

The 2011 President’s Symposium of the American Genetic Association was held in Guanajuato, Mexico, from July 23 through 26 with a focus on “Genomics and Biodiversity.” The meeting was a great success, with over 150 attendees from Mexico, United States, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Germany, Scotland, and Spain. Over a third of the attendees were students. Sessions were held at the National Genomics Laboratory for Biodiversity (LANGEBIO), a state-of-the-art facility in nearby Irapuato, and at the Hotel Camino Real, a remodeled Spanish hacienda, in Guanajuato. The Latin ambience, including great food, song, and dance, and the rifts of different accents mixing with the more ubiquitous tones of our Mexican hosts were great backdrops to the scientific themes that had brought us together. This was only the second time the annual meeting of the AGA has ventured outside of the United States (the 2006 meeting was held in Vancouver, Canada). Throughout the meeting, participants were subtly reminded of the appeal of diversity, which is central to the mission of the AGA. The meeting environment was thoroughly enjoyable and stimulating thanks to the efforts of AGA President, Scott Edwards, and LANGEBIO Director, Luis Herrera Estrella, with assistance from the local event organizer, Emilio Bolanos, of Turismo & Convenciones and from Anjanette Baker, Managing Editor of Journal of Heredity. The substance of the meeting effectively captured the issues and ideas resonating through the burgeoning field of genomics, a unifying theme bridging the broad research interests of all AGA members. The speakers (Table 1) and poster presentations covered all major biotic groups and, importantly, demonstrated that recent advances in genomics of humans and model organisms of agricultural or biomedical interest have inspired application to a wide range of practical and theoretical questions in nonmodel species and natural environments. Table 1 Symposium speakers, with titles of their talks and institute affiliations. Talks that focused on humans included the search for signatures of selection in humans from different natural environments, the reconstruction of the population history of Latin America, and the complex history of evolution in early human species. Traditional plant models were represented in talks on advances in the study of maize, the examination of epigenetics of flower development, and the search for patterns of adaptation. Therese Markow’s talk on diversification in Drosophila, the most widely recognized model of insect genomics, demonstrated how the study of natural populations can be a powerful tool for understanding the genomic underpinnings of behavioral specializations and speciation events. Forays into new ecological/evolutionary questions using genomics and transcriptomics were also presented in several nonmodel organisms, including phylogenomics in pitcher plants, microbial environmental contamination, and rapid adaptation and speciation in cichlids. Perhaps the most comprehensive example of how animal model genomics can link to a broad range of questions in evolution and conservation was provided by Robert Wayne, the recipient of the Wilhelmine Key American Genetic Association Distinguished Lecture Award. In his inspiring presentation, Wayne showed how the domestic dog genome has enabled the development of resources that have unlocked many secrets of canid evolution, including the genetic basis of several phenotypic traits, the history of domestication, and genetic selection in wild populations. Finally, several talks emphasized the challenges and opportunities ahead. Although the diverse taxa discussed provided interesting examples of both natural and synthetic experimental systems, the talks demonstrated that in spite of the promise of genomics, most research areas are constrained by the very small number of genome-enabled species, especially in nonmammalian taxa. Together, these talks clearly demonstrated that genomics has begun to permeate many areas of biological enquiry. However, they also pointed to challenges that remain before genomics can have a full and wide-ranging impact on studies of biodiversity. These include the need for: 1) more genomic data from nonmodel species, 2) inexpensive population-level tools to extend the utility of basic genomic data, 3) increased training opportunities for students and established researchers in handling large databases, 4) further development of bioinformatic tools for large data sets (e.g., cloud computing, modular programming, etc.), 5) population-level sampling, with geo-referencing and documentation of associated phenotypic characters, and 6) quality genetic maps to more efficiently leverage information for genome-enabled species (e.g., candidate genes, single-nucleotide polymorphisms). Finally, there was the implicit recognition that describing and protecting biodiversity is an international concern, requiring strong international collaborations to be effective and to deal with the many associated cultural, environmental, and political issues. Most importantly, attendees were reminded that, despite new challenges, it is an exciting and rewarding time to be involved in the study and understanding of genomics and biodiversity.

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