Vachellia drepanolobium reduced representation bisulfite sequencing raw sequence reads

Natural populations harbor substantial epigenetic diversity, but its role in ecological and evolutionary processes is not well understood. Using a classic Acacia-ant mutualism, we investigated how patterns of DNA methylation in host trees are influenced by associations with four different ant partners. We show that ant occupation induces targeted changes to DNA methylation in host trees, and that these mutualist-specific methylation patterns differ by ant species identity and are dependent on active associations. This indicates that dynamic DNA methylation is involved in the molecular regulation of phenotypic changes necessary in mediating ecological interactions.