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2001 Special Symposium, Ecological Dynamics and Genes, University of Oxford, 17-19 September 2001

The BES jointly hosted a symposium with the Natural Environment Research Council at St Catherine's College, Oxford. The programme consisted of 15 speakers from the NERC thematic programme EDGE, and was supplemented by four external speakers, and several posters.

The central focus of the programme was the application of molecular techniques to solve ecological questions. This is a rapidly developing area of ecology, and the talks spanned a very diverse range of topics, including microbial community dynamics in soils and water, gene flow and spatial dynamics, and pathogenic and symbiotic relationships.

The study of gene flow can provide insights into the adaptation of species to new ecological conditions. This theme emerged in studies of organisms from diverse taxa including fungi, insects and plants. For example, a degree of interspecific gene flow has been detected between two Dutch Elm disease fungi which have recently come into contact through range expansion. This has illustrated that the introgression of favoured genes may confer resistance to viruses commonly found in fungal populations. Interspecific gene flow may therefore have profound effects on host-pathogen interactions and the outcome of disease epidemics. A study of the latitudinal body size cline of Drosophila melanogaster has investigated the roles of gene flow and selection in maintaining the cline, and the influence of the potentially asymmetrical nature of gene flow. In another study of the silver-studded blue, Plebejus argus, and the brown argus, Aricia agestis, the non-equilibrium dynamics of these populations lead to spatial patterns of genetic variation often opposite to what may be predicted on the basis of their dispersal behaviour. These studies illustrate how both molecular methods and mathematical models can combine to explain and predict patterns in genetic structure.

Other studies have illustrated how the direct analysis of environmental DNA from micro-organisms can provide insights into the dynamics of ammonia oxidising bacteria, the impact of land use on the soil methane sink, or the acquisition of heavy metal tolerance by bacteria in the soil. PCR techniques led to bypassing the need to culture the bacteria in the laboratory (a great advantage given that less than 10% were culturable). This step forward has now been more fully exploited by the development and application of the novel technique of stable isotope probing (SIP). This allows the distinction to be made between the active and inactive bacteria, making the study of their dynamics a real possibility.

We are very grateful to Blackwells for sponsoring the evening reception. A symposium volume will be published, entitled 'Genes in the Environment', containing chapters from each of the speakers. The book will be published by Blackwells in the autumn of 2002 but a pre-publication order form is already available.

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