Genomic evidence of prevalent hybridization throughout the evolutionary history of the fig-wasp pollination mutualism

Gang Wang (), Xingtan Zhang, Edward Allen Herre, Doyle McKey, Carlos A. Machado, Wen-Bin Yu, Charles H. Cannon, Michael L. Arnold, Rodrigo A. S. Pereira, Ray Ming, Yi-Fei Liu, Yibin Wang, Dongna Ma and Jin Chen ()
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Gang Wang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Xingtan Zhang: Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences
Edward Allen Herre: Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Doyle McKey: CEFE, University of Montpellier, CNRS, University Paul Valery Montpellier 3, EPHE, IRD
Carlos A. Machado: University of Maryland
Wen-Bin Yu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Charles H. Cannon: The Morton Arboretum
Michael L. Arnold: University of Georgia
Rodrigo A. S. Pereira: FFCLRP, University of São Paulo
Ray Ming: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Yi-Fei Liu: Hubei University of Chinese Medicine
Yibin Wang: Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University
Dongna Ma: College of the Environment and Ecology, Xiamen University
Jin Chen: Chinese Academy of Sciences

Nature Communications, 2021, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: Abstract Ficus (figs) and their agaonid wasp pollinators present an ecologically important mutualism that also provides a rich comparative system for studying functional co-diversification throughout its coevolutionary history (~75 million years). We obtained entire nuclear, mitochondrial, and chloroplast genomes for 15 species representing all major clades of Ficus. Multiple analyses of these genomic data suggest that hybridization events have occurred throughout Ficus evolutionary history. Furthermore, cophylogenetic reconciliation analyses detect significant incongruence among all nuclear, chloroplast, and mitochondrial-based phylogenies, none of which correspond with any published phylogenies of the associated pollinator wasps. These findings are most consistent with frequent host-switching by the pollinators, leading to fig hybridization, even between distantly related clades. Here, we suggest that these pollinator host-switches and fig hybridization events are a dominant feature of fig/wasp coevolutionary history, and by generating novel genomic combinations in the figs have likely contributed to the remarkable diversity exhibited by this mutualism.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-20957-3

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