Lycaeides wing pattern mapping. Plebejus

The aim of this study was to investigate the genetic basis of multifaceted butterfly wing pattern variation in the Lycaeides species omplex as a case study of mapping multivariate traits in wild populations that include multiple nominal species or groups. Our hierarchical sampling design allowed us to (i) describe patterns of phenotypic and genetic covariances at different scales, (ii) explicitly test for wing pattern modules, (iii) determine the contribution of genetic constraints (i.e., genetic covariances arising from pleiotropy or tight linkage) to patterns of wing pattern covariation, and (iv) quantify the consistency of the wing pattern genetic covariance matrix (G-matrix) among populations and nominal species, and thus assess the stability of the G-matrix and determine whether evolution among groups occurs mostly in the direction of genetic covariances within groups.