Exome sequencing of deer mice on two California Channel Islands

This study examined exome variation in populations of deer mice from two of the California Channel Islands: Peromyscus maniculatus elusus from Santa Barbara Island and P. m. santacruzae from Santa Cruz Island. These populations exhibit significant differences in olfactory predator recognition, activity timing, behavior, morphology, pathogen prevalence, and population densities. We used whole exome capture to sequence 25 mice from Santa Barbara Island and 22 mice from Santa Cruz Island, generating over 300,000 SNPs to use in population genetic analyses to look for outliers between these two populations.