Description

Littorina saxatilis is a marine snail inhabiting north Atlantic shores. Sexes are separate and females can store sperm to fertilize her eggs until months later. Embryos develop under the shell of the female and are released after 1-2 months as 0.5-mm-sized crawl-away juveniles. The direct development and a restricted dispersal of juvenile and adults favour evolution of locally adapted populations over scales of metres. Common ecotypes include large and thick-shelled crab ecotypes and small and thin-shelled wave ecotypes. Difference in phenotypic traits (including size, shell shape but also behaviour and physiology) are usually largely inherited. Ecotypes evolve repeatedly in similar types of environments, and this evolution is supported by several polymorphic chromosomal inversions. Some inversions contain genes involved in high-low shore adaptation and others contain genes involved in adaptation to crab or wave environments. Ecotypes meet in contact zones and here barriers to gene flow can be partial or almost complete. The species is used as a model system for studies of local adaptation and speciation in the face of gene flow.

• Effective population size (inferred from demographic data): 10,000-40,000
• Generation time: 0.5 - 1 year (depending on ecotype)
• Life-span: 2-4 years
• Number of chromosomes: 17
• Current number of identified inversions: 22

How to cite

If you use the data presented in the genome portal from this species in your research, please cite the original publication:

• De Jode, A., Faria, R., Formenti, G., Sims, Y., Smith, T. P., Tracey, A., Wood, J. M. D., Zagrodzka, Z. B., Johannesson, K., Butlin, R. K., & Leder, E. H. (2024). Chromosome-scale Genome Assembly of the Rough Periwinkle Littorina saxatilis. Genome Biology and Evolution, 16(4), evae076. https://doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evae076

If you have used the pages for this species in the Genome Portal, please refer to it in-text as: “The Littorina saxatilis entry in the Swedish Reference Genome Portal (access date).” and use the following for the bibliography:

• Swedish Reference Genome Portal (access date), SciLifeLab Data Centre, version (version number) from https://genomes.scilifelab.se, RRID:SCR_026008.

References

• De Jode, A., Faria, R., Formenti, G., Sims, Y., Smith, T. P., Tracey, A., Wood, J. M. D., Zagrodzka, Z. B., Johannesson, K., Butlin, R. K., & Leder, E. H. (2024). Chromosome-scale Genome Assembly of the Rough Periwinkle Littorina saxatilis. Genome Biology and Evolution, 16(4), evae076. https://doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evae076

• Faria, R., Chaube, P., Morales, H. E., Larsson, T., Lemmon, A. R., Lemmon, E. M., Rafajlović, M., Panova, M., Ravinet, M., Johannesson, K., Westram, A. M., & Butlin, R. K. (2019). Multiple chromosomal rearrangements in a hybrid zone between Littorina saxatilis ecotypes. Molecular Ecology, 28(6), 1375–1393. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.14972

• Johannesson, K. (2016). What can be learnt from a snail? Evolutionary Applications, 9(1), 153–165. https://doi.org/10.1111/eva.12277

• Johannesson, K., Faria, R., Le Moan, A., Rafajlović, M., Westram, A. M., Butlin, R. K., & Stankowski, S. (2024). Diverse pathways to speciation revealed by marine snails. Trends in Genetics, 40(4), 337–351. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tig.2024.01.002

• Johannesson, K., Panova, M., Kemppainen, P., André, C., Rolan-Alvarez, E., & Butlin, R. K. (2010). Repeated evolution of reproductive isolation in a marine snail: Unveiling mechanisms of speciation. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 365(1547), 1735–1747. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0256

• Koch, E. L., Morales, H. E., Larsson, J., Westram, A. M., Faria, R., Lemmon, A. R., Lemmon, E. M., Johannesson, K., & Butlin, R. K. (2021). Genetic variation for adaptive traits is associated with polymorphic inversions in Littorina saxatilis. Evolution Letters, 5(3), 196–213. https://doi.org/10.1002/evl3.227

• Stankowski, S., Zagrodzka, Z. B., Galindo, J., Montaño-Rendón, M., Faria, R., Mikhailova, N., Blakeslee, A. M. H., Arnason, E., Broquet, T., Morales, H. E., Grahame, J. W., Westram, A. M., Johannesson, K., & Butlin, R. K. (2023). Whole-genome phylogeography of the intertidal snail Littorina saxatilis. Evolutionary Journal of the Linnean Society, 2(1), kzad002. https://doi.org/10.1093/evolinnean/kzad002

• Stankowski, S., Zagrodzka, Z. B., Garlovsky, M. D., Pal, A., Shipilina, D., Castillo, D. G., Lifchitz, H., Le Moan, A., Leder, E., Reeve, J., Johannesson, K., Westram, A. M., & Butlin, R. K. (2024). The genetic basis of a recent transition to live-bearing in marine snails. Science, 383(6678), 114–119. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adi2982

• Westram, A. M., Faria, R., Johannesson, K., & Butlin, R. (2021). Using replicate hybrid zones to understand the genomic basis of adaptive divergence. Molecular Ecology, 30(15), 3797–3814. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.15861

Changelog

• 15/10/2024 - Species first published on the Portal