Population Genetics for Animal Conservation

Giorgio Bertorelle currently teaches Biometry, Phylogeny Reconstruction and Conservation Genetics at the University of Ferrara, Italy. He is the president and co-founder of the Italian Society for Evolutionary Biology. Michael W. Bruford, formerly Head of the Conservation Genetics Group at the Institute of Zoology, London, has been professor and research group leader at the Cardiff School of Biosciences since 1999, where he teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in conservation biology and molecular ecology. Heidi C. Hauffe trained in evolutionary biology and established the first genetics laboratory at the Centro di Ecologia Alpina, Trento, Italy, in 1997. Now at the Edmund Mach Foundation, her research interests range from rodent-borne viruses to speciation to conservation genetics of alpine mammals. She is currently affiliated to the University of York, UK, and the Institute of Vertebrate Biology, CZ. Annapaola Rizzoli is currently the coordinator of the Environmental and Natural Resources Division and head of the Wildlife Ecology and Epidemiology Group at the Edmund Mach Foundation. Her main research interests are host–parasite interactions and emerging zoonotic and vector-borne diseases. Cristiano Vernesi is a researcher at the Edmund Mach Foundation, Trento, Italy. He is also one of the founders and scientific director of the Association 'Biosfera', a non-profit association devoted to research and teaching in conservation biology.

• 1. Introduction Heidi C. Hauffe and Valerio Sbordoni; 2. Statistical methods for identifying hybrids and groups Eric C. Anderson; 3. How to use Migrate or why are Markov chain Monte Carlo programs difficult to use? Peter Beerli; 4. Nested clade phylogeographic analysis for conservation genetics Jennifer E. Buhay, Keith A. Crandall and David Posada; 5. A comparison of methods for constructing evolutionary networks from intraspecific DNA sequences Patrick Mardulyn, Insa Cassens and Michel C. Milinkovitch; 6. Challenges in assessing adaptive genetic diversity: overview of methods and empirical illustrations Aurélie Bonin and Louis Bernatchez; 7. Monitoring and detecting translocations using genetic data Giorgio Bertorelle, Chiara Papetti, Heidi C. Hauffe and Luigi Boitani; 8. Non-invasive genetic analysis in conservation Benoît Goossens and Michael W. Bruford; 9. The role of ancient DNA in conservation biology Jon Beadell, Yvonne Chan and Robert Fleischer; 10. Future-proofing genetic units for conservation: time's up for subspecies as the debate gets out of neutral! Michael W. Bruford; 11. Genetic diversity and fitness related traits in endangered salmonids Katriina Tiira and Craig R. Primmer; 12. Genetics and conservation on islands: the Galápagos giant tortoise as a case study Claudio Ciofi, Adalgisa Caccone, Luciano B. Beheregaray, Michel C. Milinkovitch, Michael Russello and Jeffrey R. Powell; 13. Evolution of population genetic structure in marine mammal species A. Rus Hoelzel; 14. Recent developments in molecular tools for conservation Cristiano Vernesi and Michael W. Bruford; 15. Theoretical outlook Mark Beaumont.

'… presents some new perspectives on particular issues, important when genetic technology and statistical analysis are changing as fast as they are now.' Trends in Ecology and Evolution