Post-symposium Report

GENETICS OF ADAPTATION

An international symposium at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India

Organizers: Dr. Deepa Agashe, Dr. Krushnamegh Kunte, and Prof. Gaiti Hasan, NCBS.

Dates: 28 November to 1 December 2016

Venue: Dasheri, NCBS

Funding: We thank the following societies and funding agencies for their generous financial support:

Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE): US $ 8,000
Company of Biologists: £ 2,000
Simons Centre for Living Machines, NCBS: Rs. 5,00,000
Dept. of Biotechnology, Govt. of India: Rs. 2,00,000
Dept. of Science and Technology, Govt. of India: Rs. 1,50,000

Total number of invited participants: 20 (list appended)
Total applications for contributed talks and posters: 40. Accepted: 25.
Total number of participants: 29 for talks, 17 for posters. In addition, at least 100 NCBS students and post-docs attended select talks through the course of three days of the symposium. Approximately 40% of the participants were women.
Student gift memberships to the Society for the Study of Evolution: 20, as per the SSE’s condition for funding support.

Brief report of the symposium: The NCBS celebrated its 25 years of cutting-edge research in biological sciences, from January 2016 to January 2017. As part of the silver jubilee celebrations, NCBS organized a string of international academic meetings in 2016. The evolutionary biology and genetics group at NCBS organized an international symposium in Bangalore entitled Genetics of Adaptation for four days, from 28 November to 1 December 2016.

Our goal was to bring together a broad representation of evolutionary biologists, geneticists and developmental biologists who studied the evolutionary drivers and genetic and developmental mechanisms of key adaptations in nature. Participants were either evolutionary biologists with notable accomplishments in genetics and developmental biology of adaptations, or good geneticists and developmental biologists with their work informing ideas in population genetics and evolutionary theory/genomics. Together, we aimed to synthesize recent developments in evolutionary biology, population genetics theory, developmental tools and genomics technologies, which have fueled explosive growth in understanding molecular genetic and developmental bases of adaptations even in non-model organisms. The case studies (and speakers) were carefully chosen to include adaptations for which both the evolutionary/ecological significance and molecular genetic/developmental bases have been studied well in the past few years. The participants also worked on all kinds of organisms, from bacteria to plants and animals, and in areas from basic (e.g., population genetics and evolutionary biology) to applied sciences (e.g., agricultural genetics). The invited speakers were from India, Singapore, Australia, several European countries, the United States and Canada, making this a truly inter-continental symposium. There was plenty of time for discussions and interactions, both formal and informal, which resulted in very fruitful and prolonged discussions, some of which leading to scientific collaborations between scientists across multiple countries. Overall, the symposium was deemed to be quite successful, which is important for the goal of spreading evolutionary genetics in broader biological research fields, especially in developing scientific powerhouses such as in India.

Symposium proceedings: The journal Molecular Biology and Evolution (http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/), published by the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution, has agreed to publish a selection of reviews and original articles as a special issue in 2017, titled after this symposium. Reviews and original articles have been invited for this MBE special issue both from the symposium participants and other prominent people in the field who could not attend the symposium. A copy of the special issue, when published, will be sent to the funding agencies that helped organize this symposium, and the symposium grants will be acknowledged.

List of Presenters:

Financial Report:

DAILY SCHEDULE OF THE GENETICS OF ADAPTATION SYMPOSIUM

MONDAY, 28 NOVEMBER: WORKSHOPS FOR STUDENTS

Morning session:

9‒10:30am: Mark Kirkpatrick: Population Genetics of Adaptations. Venue: Malgova. Restricted participation (registered participants only, but total ca 50).

10:45‒12:15am: George Perry: The Application of Ancient DNA Data to the Study of Evolution. Venue: Malgova.

12:30‒1:30pm: lunch

Afternoon session:

1:30‒3pm: Catharine Rankin: Studying Genes and Behaviour. Venue: Malgova.

3:15‒6:30pm, with a 15-min coffee break. Concurrent workshops, between which students choose:

(a) Adriana Briscoe and Antonia Monteiro: Mining Transcriptomes and Genomes for Insights into the Evolution of Gene Families and Testing Their Function in Adaptive Evolution via Gene Editing Tools.
Venue: Raspuri. Restricted participation (registered participants only, total ca 30). Participants are required to bring their own laptops and install some software required for this workshop.

(b) Jonathan Flint and Richard Mott: The Use of Mixed Models in Genetic Studies. Restricted participation (registered participants only, total ca 25). Venue: Raspuri.

7pm onward: Welcome dinner and social

TUESDAY, 29 November:

Morning session: Genomes, Gene families and long-term adaptation. Chair: Dasarathi Palakodeti.

9‒9:30: Registration

9:30‒9:45am: Introduction

9:45‒10:15am: Deepa Agashe: The Evolution of Bacterial tRNA Genes

10:15‒10:45am: L. Shashidhara: Hox Protein Ultrabithorax and Evolution of Insect Wing Number and Morphology

10:45‒11:15am: Coffee break

11:15‒11:45am: Himanshu Sinha: A Pervasive, Highly Interconnected Genetic Network Underlies all Phenotypes

11:45am‒12pm: Mrudula Sane: Evolution of Trade-offs Under Genetic Drift

12‒12:15pm: Preethi Ravi: Flying to the Tunes of a Neuropeptide Receptor

12:15‒1:30pm: Lunch

1:30‒3:30pm: Posters and group discussions, and coffee

Afternoon session: Theory and Modern Methods. Chair: Mukund Thattai.

3:30‒4pm: Mark Kirkpatrick: Sex-antagonistic Selection and the Evolution of Sexual Dimorphism

4‒4:30pm: Richard Mott: Interpreting Genome Annotation and Genetic Variation from the Standpoint of Evolution

4:30‒4:45pm: Lavanya Challagundla: Population Genomics Framework of the Origin and Spread of Pathogenic Staphylococci

4:45‒5:15: Coffee

5:15‒5:45pm: Jonathan Flint: Genetic Analysis of Complex Traits in Outbred Mice

7pm onward: Dinner and social

WEDNESDAY, 30 NOVEMBER:

Morning and afternoon sessions: Interactions with the environment. Chairs: Raghu Padinjat and Sandeep Krishna.

9:30‒10am: Benjamin Prud’homme: The Evolution of Oviposition Site Choice in the Fruit Pest Drosophila suzukii

10‒10:30am: Adriana Briscoe: The Evolution of Colour Vision in Heliconius Butterflies: Genes, Physiology and Behavior

10:30‒10:45am: Eben Gering: Recent Adaptation in Kauai’s Feral Gallus gallus

10:45‒11:15am: Coffee break

11:15am‒11:45pm: Christen Mirth: Mechanisms Regulating Robust Versus Plastic Responses to Environmental Conditions in Developing Organs

11:45‒12:15pm: Antonia Monteiro: Evolution of Butterfly Wing Patterns and Behaviors in Response to Seasonal Environmental Variation

12:15‒12:30pm: Megha: Neuropeptidergic Contributions to Development Under Starvation

12:30-2pm: Lunch

2‒4pm: Posters and group discussions, and coffee

Chair: Uma Ramakrishnan

4‒4:30pm: Gaiti Hasan: Neuromodulatory Signals in Drosophila Larvae Drive an Adaptive Response to Nutrient Stress

4:30‒5pm: Kavita Jain: Rapid Adaptation of a Polygenic Trait after a Sudden Environmental Shift

5‒5:30: Coffee break

5:30‒6pm: Vijay Sharma and Sheeba Vasu: Genetic Basis of Chronotypes: Lessons from ‘Larks’ and ‘Owls’ Among Fruit Flies

6‒6:15pm: Ali: Effect of Sexual Selection on Male Reproductive Ageing in Drosophila melanogaster

7pm onward: Dinner and social

THURSDAY, 1 DECEMBER:

Morning session: Genetic Architecture of Adaptations. Chairs: Dimple Notani and R. Sowdhamini.

9:30‒10am: George Perry: Polygenic Adaptation to Tropical Rainforest Habitats in Human Hunter-gatherers

10‒10:30am: Doris Bachtrog: Chromatin Sinks & Sex-specific Aging in Drosophila: A Role for theY Chromosome?

10:30‒10:45am: Martin Kapun: Adaptive Evolution of Clinal Inversion Polymorphisms in Drosophila melanogaster

10:45‒11:15am: Coffee break

11:15am‒11:45pm: Catharine Rankin: Genetic Dissection of Learning in C. elegans Sheds Light on the Adaptive Nature of Response Plasticity

11:45‒12:15pm: Sreelaja Nair: Cell Biological Responses in the Vertebrate Embryo Consequent to Alterations in Ploidy

12:15‒12:30pm: Vinod Kumar: A Genomics Approach Identifies Genetic Variations Under Positive Selection Contributing to Variability in Innate Immune Responses

12:30‒2pm: Lunch

2‒4pm: Posters and group discussions, and coffee

Afternoon session: Genetics of Social Interactions. Chais: Sanjay Sane.

4‒4:30pm: Jean-Francois Ferveur: Incipient Speciation in Drosophila: Genes, Sensory Signals and "Eco-devo" Adaptation

4:30‒5pm: Krushnamegh Kunte: Evolution and Genetics of Sexually Dimorphic Butterfly Wing Patterns

5‒5:30pm: Nicolas Gompel: Regulatory Evolution and the Diversification of Pigmentation Patterns in Drosophila

5:30‒6pm: Final remarks

7pm onward: Banquet

A copy of this report (https://www.ncbs.res.in/events/genetics-adaptation-report) is also available from the symposium website (https://www.ncbs.res.in/events/genetics-adaptation).