Deleterious mutations decrease reproductive fitness and are ubiquitous in genomes. Given
that many organisms face ongoing threats of extinction, there is interest in elucidating the …

Deleterious genetic variation is abundant in wild populations, and understanding the
ecological and conservation implications of such variation is an area of active research …

The current rate of species extinction is rapidly approaching unprecedented highs, and life
on Earth presently faces a sixth mass extinction event driven by anthropogenic activity …

In cases of severe wildlife population decline, a key question is whether recovery efforts will
be impeded by genetic factors, such as inbreeding depression. Decades of excess mortality …

Increasing habitat fragmentation leads to wild populations becoming small, isolated, and
threatened by inbreeding depression. However, small populations may be able to purge …

Human-driven habitat fragmentation and loss have led to a proliferation of small and
isolated plant and animal populations with high risk of extinction. One of the main threats to …

Habitat loss and population fragmentation pose severe threats to biodiversity and the
survival of many species. Population isolation and the decline in effective population size …

The relative evolutionary roles of adaptive and non-adaptive processes remain a central
question in population genetics. Resolution of this debate has been difficult as an …

A central question in evolutionary biology is why some species have more genetic diversity
than others and a no less important question is why selection efficacy varies among species …

The purging of deleterious alleles has been hypothesized to mitigate inbreeding depression,
but its effectiveness in endangered species remains debatable. To understand how …