Most adaption processes have a polygenic genetic basis, but even with the recent explosive growth of genomic data we are still lacking a unified framework describing the dynamics of selected alleles. Building on recent theoretical and empirical work we introduce the concept of adaptive architecture, which extends the genetic architecture of an adaptive trait by factors influencing its adaptive potential and population genetic principles. Because adaptation can be typically achieved by many different combinations of adaptive alleles (redundancy), we describe how two characteristics — heterogeneity among loci and non-parallelism between replicated populations — are hallmarks for the characterization of polygenic adaptation in evolving populations. We discuss how this unified framework can be applied to natural and experimental populations.

大多数适应过程具有多基因遗传基础，但即使最近基因组数据呈爆炸式增长，我们仍然缺乏描述选定等位基因动态的统一框架。在最近的理论和实证工作的基础上，我们引入了适应性结构的概念，它通过影响适应性潜力和种群遗传原理的因素扩展了适应性特征的遗传结构。因为适应性通常可以通过适应性等位基因的许多不同组合（冗余）来实现，我们描述了两个特征 - 基因座之间的异质性和复制种群之间的非平行性 - 是表征进化种群中多基因适应的标志。我们讨论如何将这个统一的框架应用于自然和实验群体。