Final Report Summary - AGORA (AGORA - Ancient Genomics of Rainforests)
The main objective of the project AGORA- “Ancient Genomics of Rainforests” - was to contribute to the reconstruction of the natural history of rainforests from West and Central Africa through the genetic study of a set of widespread tropical tree species by combining my expertise in population genetics and plant systematics, with the host Professor M Thomas P Gilbert (MTPG) background in state-of-the art genomics methodology.
The evolutionary history of tropical rainforests has been largely conditioned by the penultimate and last Ice Ages. Dry environmental conditions during these periods in Central Africa lead to the contraction of rainforests in favor of savannas and survival of rainforest species in a few refugia. This seems to explain why African rainforests harbour a lower number of species than the other two main rainforest massifs in South America and South Eastern Asia. Based on the rate of endemic species the location of several refuge areas in Africa has been proposed. The project AGORA contributed to the understanding of rainforest evolution by generating genomic data from eight rainforest trees from Central Africa, which support a scenario of past barriers to gene flow and a history of fragmentation of the rainforest.
The evolutionary history of tropical rainforests has been largely conditioned by the penultimate and last Ice Ages. Dry environmental conditions during these periods in Central Africa lead to the contraction of rainforests in favor of savannas and survival of rainforest species in a few refugia. This seems to explain why African rainforests harbour a lower number of species than the other two main rainforest massifs in South America and South Eastern Asia. Based on the rate of endemic species the location of several refuge areas in Africa has been proposed. The project AGORA contributed to the understanding of rainforest evolution by generating genomic data from eight rainforest trees from Central Africa, which support a scenario of past barriers to gene flow and a history of fragmentation of the rainforest.