Population Genetic Structure of Acacia Brevispica from East Africa

Abstract

The genus Acacia consists of nearly 1,200 species of woody plants that play many key ecological roles as the dominant woody vegetation in dry tropical forest-savannas worldwide. More than 100 of these species can be found in the savannas of East Africa. Here we report allozyme variation in two populations of Acacia brevispica from the Mplala Research Centre in Kenya. Of the 12 putative loci, 11 were polymorphic in at least one population. Individuals exhibited high heterozygosity (273} and differences between populations were low (1.33). The latter result suggests high levels of gene movement between populations located within 10 km of one another. This gene movement could result from long-distance pollinator movement or dispersal of seeds by large herbivorous mammals.