Data from: Are molecular markers useful predictors of adaptive potential?

Estimates of molecular genetic variation are often used as a cheap and simple surrogate for a population's adaptive potential, yet empirical evidence suggests they are unlikely to be a valid proxy. However, this evidence is based on molecular genetic variation poorly predicting estimates of adaptive potential rather than how well it predicts true values. As a consequence, the relationship has been systematically underestimated and the precision with which it could be measured severely overstated. By collating a large database, and using suitable statistical methods, we obtain a 95% upper bound of 0.26 for the proportion of variance in quantitative genetic variation explained by molecular diversity. The relationship is probably too weak to be useful, but this conclusion must be taken as provisional: less noisy estimates of quantitative genetic variation are required. In contrast, and perhaps surprisingly, current sampling strategies appear sufficient for characterising a population's molecular genetic variation at comparable markers.

分子遗传变异的估计值常被用作种群适应潜力的廉价且简便的替代指标，但实证证据表明，这类估计值不太可能成为有效的代理变量。然而，现有此类证据的支撑逻辑仅为：分子遗传变异对适应潜力的估计值预测能力欠佳，而非其对真实值的预测表现。因此，二者的关联程度被系统性低估，而其测量精度则被严重高估。本研究通过整合大型数据库并采用恰当的统计方法，得到了分子多样性对数量遗传变异方差的解释比例的95%置信上限为0.26。该关联的强度或许过低，难以满足应用需求，但这一结论仍属暂定：我们仍需获得噪声更低的数量遗传变异估计值。与之形成对比且颇为出人意料的是，当前的采样策略似乎足以通过可比标记对种群的分子遗传变异进行表征。