Amount Awarded: $20,000
Oceanic Islands are natural laboratories that allow study of evolution in unprecedented ways. However, although the islands are well known for adaptive radiation, most lineages that have colonized the islands have not undergone ecological diversification, begging the question of why? Are there attributes of colonists that predispose them to adaptive radiation? The Hawaiian archipelago provides some of the best-known examples for rampant adaptive radiations, including a radiation of long-jawed spiders (Tetragnathidae), and another of tangle web spiders (Theridiidae) and crab spiders (Thomisidae). However, among dwarf spiders (Linyphiidae), the only known radiation is that of the genus Orsonwelles, which has diversified without ecological shifts. A recent environmental DNA study has found an unexpected diversity of linyphiids unrelated to Orsonwelles, suggesting that there are multiple undescribed species that comprise a hitherto unknown Hawaiian radiation. Our preliminary findings show that, unlike Orsonwelles, several close relatives co-occur in the same community and some species seem to be present at different sites. Such a system, where we two lineages of the same family have colonized the islands separately, provide an unusual opportunity to understand the genomics basis for diversification, and hence provide insights into the processes that underpin the formation of biodiversity overall.