Adaptation Genomics in Urban Environments

International audienceThe field of urban ecology has provided many fascinating examples of organisms that display novel biological features in urban environments compared to natural habitats. Quantitative genetics provides a framework that can be used to investigate whether this phenotypic differentiation between urban and natural habitats is adaptive and is the result of heritable changes in response to divergent selection. New generation sequencing tools offer unique opportunities to expand our understanding of the genes and genetic mechanisms implicated in evolution in urban environments. This chapter first reviews quantitative genetics studies investigating the mechanisms of evolution in the city. It then reviews pioneering genomic studies that have shed light on the genes and genetic mechanisms implicated in urban microevolution. The authors discuss how further use of cost-effective high-resolution genomic approaches may improve the comprehension of both genomic and epigenomic mechanisms implicated in such evolution. Finally, the chapter provides an overview of how the integrated use of quantitative genetics, field experiments, and genomics could expand our knowledge of the processes leading to urban evolution