Translocations of threatened species can reduce the risk of extinction from a catastrophic event. For plants, translocation consists of moving individuals, seeds, or cuttings from a native (source) population to a new site. Ideally a translocation population would be genetically diverse and consist of fit founding individuals. In practice, there are challenges to designing such a population, including constraints on the availability of material, and tradeoffs between different goals. Here, we present an approach for designing a translocation population that identifies sets of founders that are optimized according to multiple criteria (e.g., genetic diversity), while also conforming to constraints on the representation of different founders (e.g., propagation success). It uses flexible inputs, including SNP genotypes, matrices of similarity between individuals, and vectors of phenotype data. We apply the approach to a critically endangered plant, Hibbertia puberula subsp. glabrescens (Dilleniaceae), which was genotyped at thousands of SNP loci. The goals of minimizing genetic similarity among the founding individuals and maximizing genetic diversity were largely complementary: populations optimized for one of these criteria were near-optimal for the other. We also performed analyses in which we minimized genetic similarity among founding individuals while imposing selection (against hypothetical deleterious alleles, and against undesirable phenotypes, respectively), and here characterized sharp tradeoffs. This was useful in allowing the benefits of selection to be weighed against costs in terms of genetic similarity. In summary, we present an approach for designing a translocation population that allows flexible inputs, the imposition of realistic constraints, and examination of conflicting goals.

中文翻译：

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优化易位种群的遗传组成：纳入限制条件和相互矛盾的目标。

受威胁物种的易位可减少因灾难性事件而灭绝的风险。对于植物，易位包括将个体，种子或插穗从本地（源）种群移至新地点。理想情况下，易位种群在遗传上应是多样的，并且由适合创建的个体组成。在实践中，设计这样的总体存在挑战，包括对材料可用性的限制以及不同目标之间的权衡。在这里，我们提出了一种设计易位种群的方法，该方法可以识别根据多种标准（例如，遗传多样性）进行了优化的创始人的集合，同时还符合对不同创始人的代表的限制（例如，繁殖成功）。它使用灵活的输入，包括SNP基因型，个人之间的相似性矩阵和表型数据的载体。我们将这种方法应用于濒临灭绝的植物Hibbertia puberula subsp。glabrescens（Dilleniaceae），在数千个SNP位点进行了基因分型。使创始个体之间的遗传相似性最小化和遗传多样性最大化的目标在很大程度上是互补的：针对其中一个标准进行了优化的种群在另一个方面则接近于最佳。我们还进行了分析，在进行选择时（针对假设的有害等位基因，分别针对不利的表型），我们将创始个体之间的遗传相似性降至最低，并在此进行了权衡。这在根据遗传相似性权衡选择的好处和成本之间是很有用的。总之，