Indicators for monitoring changes in genetic variation for conservation of biodiversity

The need to conserve genetic biodiversity is widely recognized in international and national policy, and new goals for the coming thirty years are currently in progress within the framework of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. Guiding principles exist for how much genetic diversity that needs to be maintained over time.

We have recently experienced, however, that measurable, cost-effective, and easy to grasp limiting values – indicators - are missing and requested by managers and agencies.

We have also found that transforming accepted, general conservation genetic guidelines into such indicators requires scientific elaborations, particularly for populations that are not isolated but part of spatially structured population systems.

This project will apply new theoretical developments, computer simulations, genomic data, and statistic tools with the aim of providing indicators and threshold recommendations that can be readily used by national agencies to cost-effectively monitor genetic diversity for effective policy implementation.

The work includes exploring how current conservation genetic guidelines can be transformed into measures and limiting values that can be obtained for natural population systems from molecular genetic/genomic data.

Guidelines for conservation of sufficient levels of genetic diversity between populations are missing but will be elaborated, including indicators and threshold values.