XVI International Botanical Congess

The evolutionary potential of a species is of primary concern in conservation biology. Such evolutionary potential may be described by the genetic and phenotypic diversity of a species, its colonizing ability, as well as by its propensity to locally adapt and eventually speciate. Clearly, studies above the population-level are a necessary step towards an understanding of what determines a species niche breadth. In this talk, I will describe how the evolution of dispersal might affect the evolutionary potential of a species, by taking examples from widespread and endemic plant species. I will then compare population structure of both genetic markers and quantitative characters in two endangered species, and suggest that information derived from genetic markers is likely to differ depending on the (geographic) distance among populations, and thus on the species considered. Methods used range from mathematical models to demographic surveys of natural populations, through population and quantitative genetics studies.