Authors: Moises Exposito-Alonso 1,2,3; Tom Booker 4,5; Lucas Czech 1; Tadashi Fukami 2; Lauren Gillespie 1,6; Shannon Hateley 1; Christopher Kyriazis 7; Patricia Lang 2; Laura Leventhal 1,2; David Nogues-Bravo 8; Veronica Pagowski 2; Megan Ruffley 1; Jeffrey Spence 9; Sebastian Toro Arana 1,2; Clemens Weiss 9; Erin Zess 1
Affiliations: 1) Department of Plant Biology, Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford, USA; 2) Department of Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, USA; 3) Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford, USA; 4) Department of Zoology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada; 5) Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada; 6) Department of Computer Science, Stanford University, Stanford, USA; 7) Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Los Angeles, USA; 8) Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate, GLOBE Inst., Univ. of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark; 9) Department of Genetics, Stanford University, Stanford, USA
Keywords: Ecological & conservation genetics
More species than ever before are at risk of extinction due to anthropogenic habitat loss and climate change. But even species that are not threatened have seen reductions in their populations and geographic ranges, likely impacting their genetic diversity. Although preserving genetic diversity is key to maintaining adaptability of species, we lack predictive tools and global estimates of genetic diversity loss across ecosystems. By bridging theories of biodiversity and population genetics, we introduce a mathematical framework to understand the loss of naturally occurring DNA mutations within a species. Analyzing genome-wide variation data of 10,126 geo-tagged individuals from 19 plant and animal species, we show that genome-wide diversity follows a power law with geographic area, which can predict genetic diversity loss in computer simulations of population losses. Given pre-21st century values of ecosystem transformations, we estimate that over 10% of genetic diversity may be lost, already surpassing the United Nations targets for genetic preservation. These estimated losses could rapidly accelerate with advancing climate change and habitat destruction, highlighting the need for new forecasting tools that facilitate implementation of policies to protect genetic resources globally.