Studying fine-scale spatial genetic patterns across life stages is a powerful approach to identify ecological processes acting within tree populations. We investigated spatial genetic dynamics across five life stages in the insect-pollinated and vertebrate-dispersed tropical tree Prunus africana in Kakamega Forest, Kenya. Using six highly polymorphic microsatellite loci, we assessed genetic diversity and spatial genetic structure (SGS) from seed rain and seedlings, and different sapling stages to adult trees. We found significant SGS in all...

Heterosis, also known as hybrid vigor, is the superior performance of a heterozygous hybrid relative to its homozygous parents. Despite the scientific curiosity of this phenotypic phenomenon and its significance for food production in agriculture, its genetic basis is insufficiently understood. Studying heterosis in yeast can potentially yield insights into its genetic basis, can allow one to test the different hypotheses that have been proposed to explain the phenomenon and allows better understanding of how...