Faubet P and Gaggiotti OE 2007. A New Bayesian Method to Identify the Environmental Factors That Influence Recent Migration. Genetics 178:1491–1504. DOI: 10.1534/genetics.107.082560
If it is fair to assume that your sampling takes place after reproduction & before migration in your system of populations and the degree of neutral genetic divergence exceeds 0.1, then keep reading.
Nice methodological implementation allowing for the estimation of recent migration rates and their relationships with environmental /spatial variables. The authors measure the strength of gametic disequilibrium using Bayesian modelling to estimate migration rates. Although in the right direction it seems that the method has some limitations that may prevent wide use at the short term:
- The method is effective if long-term migration is weak (less than five effective migrants).
- No standard package for analysis is provided yet. R-code has to be requested to the authors.
- Convergence issues require some degree of Bayesian expertise to use the method effectively.
Luckily the authors provide quite good detail about the models and probably the “Resident Helsinki Bayesians” could assist to those interested in trying it out.
