Wei Zhang, Ph.D.
Evolutionary genomics and population genetics
Professor, College of Life Sciences, Peking University
tel：
E-mail：weizhangvv@pku.edu.cn
1. The origin and genetic mechanism of leaf mimicry.
2. The determination and development of sexual dimorphism in insects.
3. Characterization and evolutionary modeling for adaptive introgression.
1、 Characterizing the genetic basis and evolutionary history of supergene mimicry in Asian swallowtail butterflies
Sex-limited Batesian mimicry in butterflies offers a classic example to study both sex-limited polymorphism and frequency-dependent selection. For decades, the entire female-limited mimetic wing phenotype in Papilio polytes has been considered controlled by a single Mendelian ‘supergene’ but what a supergene is has been debated. We identified the cause of supergene mimicry in P. polytes, and we found the supergene is a single gene, doublesex, a well-known central player involved in insect sex-determination. Moreover, the doublesex mimetic haplotype is maintained within a chromosomal inversion (Kunte et al., Nature, 2014). We also extended this study to the entire polytes species group to trace the origin and evolution of supergene mimicry. Our results suggest that sexual dimorphism and female-limited polymorphism are a result of ancient balancing selection together with independent origins of similar morphs in different lineages and secondary loss of polymorphism in other lineages. In addition, both natural selection and genetic drift might have contributed to the secondary loss of polymorphism (Zhang et al., Nat. Commun., 2017).
2、 Studying introgression, adaptation and speciation in butterflies
The butterfly genus Heliconius offers an excellent system to study hybridization and introgression. We examined the patterns of introgression among closely related species and our results reveal that hybridization tends to reduce the accumulation of pergence at neutral sites (Kronforst et al., Cell Rep., 2013). In addition, we showed a pair of distantly related co-mimetic species maintained their mimetic wing patterns by adaptive introgression and depicted a genome-wide portrait of introgression among distantly related Heliconius species. During this process, we developed an efficient and comprehensive workflow to identify putative introgression signatures (Zhang et al., Genome Biol., 2016). We also studied hybrid speciation in North American swallowtail butterflies. We characterized and inferred genomic mosaicism and identified a variety of targets of adaptive evolution in hybrid species Papilio appalachiensis (Zhang et al., Genome Biol. Evol., 2013).
3、 Developing methods to fully unlock the scientific potential of butterflies
Butterflies have served as important research objects of studies in ecology and evolution. However, their highly heterozygous genomes have hindered them from being fully unlocked as model organisms. We have dedicated our research efforts to performing genome assemblies from highly heterozygous, outbred butterflies and developing precise and efficient genome editing using CRISPR/Cas9. Besides, we also explored evolutionary patterns of genome-wide pergence among three focal butterfly species (Li et al., Nat. Commun., 2015).
4、 Uncovering the genetics of monarch butterfly warning coloration
The monarch butterfly Danaus plexippus is the world’s most famous insect and is particularly well-known because of its massive annual migration across North America and bright warning coloration. By sequencing archived and current D. plexippus samples, we tracked the genetic control of monarch warning coloration into a single gene. This research was as a part of the 101 monarch butterfly genome project (Zhan et al., Nature, 2014).
Zhang W, Lohman DJ. (2024) Uncovering the functional basis of mantids that resemble plants. Sci. China-Life Sci., 67: 215-216.
Yao ZT, Sun XJ, Wu XS, Zhu FQ, Huang JH, Zhang W, Ma WH, Hua HX, Lin YJ. (2024) Functional and evolutionary analysis of key enzymes triacylglycerol lipase, glycogen hydrolases in the glycerol and glucose biosynthesis pathway and cellular chaperones for freeze-tolerance of the Rice stem borer, Chilo suppressalis. Int. J Biol. Macromol., 282: 136861.
Wang ST, Girardello M, Zhang W. (2024) Potential and progress of studying mountain biopersity by means of butterfly genetics and genomics. J. Genet. Genomics, 51: 292-301.
Teng D, Zhang W. (2024) The persification of butterfly wing patterns: progress and prospects. Curr. Opin. Insect Sci., 61: 101137.
Huang GP, Zhang YB, Zhang W, Wei FW. (2024) Genetic mechanisms of animal camouflage: an interdisciplinary perspective. Trends Genet., 40: 613-620.
Zhang LJ, Shi ZA, Chen ZY, von Rintelen T, Zhang W, Lou ZJ. (2024) Rediscovery and systematics of the enigmatic genus Helicostoa reveals a new species of sessile freshwater snail with remarkable sexual dimorphism. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B Biol. Sci., 91: 20231557.
Li FY, Jiang TY, Zhang W, Li SQ. (2024) Ecological trait pergence over evolutionary time underlies the origin and maintenance of tropical spider persity. Ecography, 2024: e07586.
Zhang YB, Zhu QJ, Shao Y, Jiang YC, Ouyang YD, Zhang L, Zhang W. (2023) Inferring historical introgression with deep learning. Syst. Biol., 72: 1013-1038.
Zeng H, Zhao D, Zhang ZX, Gao HZ, Zhang W. (2023) Imperfect ant mimicry contributes to local adaptation in a jumping spider. iScience, 26: 106747.
Zhang W, Zhang L, Zhang WY. (2023) Editorial: The origination of genetic novelties: New genes, new regulations, and new cell types. Front. Genet., 13: 1118926.
Wang ZC, Sun JN, Gao Y, Xue YW, Zhang YB, Li K, Zhang W, Zhang C, Zu J, Zhang L. (2023) Fusang: A framework for phylogenetic tree inference via deep learning. Nucl. Acids Res., 51: 10909-10923.
Ge DY, Wen ZX, Feijo A, Lissovsky A, Zhang W, Chen JL, Yan CC, She HS, Zhang DZ, Cheng YL, Lu L, Wu XL, Mu DP, Zhang YB, Xia L, Qu YH, Vogler AP, Yang QS. (2023) Genomic consequences and demographic response to pervasive hybridization over time in climate-sensitive pikas. Mol. Biol. Evol., 40: msac274.
Yang WH, Cui JX, Chen YX, Wang C, Yin YZ, Zhang W, Liu SL, Sun C, Li H, Duan YG, Song F, Cai WZ, Hines HM, Tian L. (2023) Genetic modification of a Hox locus drives mimetic color pattern variation in a highly polymorphic bumble bee. Mol. Biol. Evol. 40: msad261.
Wang ST, Teng DQ, Li XY, Yang PW, Da W, Zhang YM, Zhang YB, Liu GH, Zhang XS, Wan WT, Dong ZW, Wang DH, Huang S, Jiang ZS, Wang QY, Lohman DJ, Wu YJ, Zhang LL, Jia FH, Westerman E, Zhang L, Wang W, Zhang W. (2022) The evolution and persification of oakleaf butterflies. Cell, 185: 3138-3152.
Wu NN, Evans E, Van Schooten B, Meléndez-Rosa M, Ortiz Y, Planas Soto-Navarro SM, Van Belleghem SM, Counterman BA, Papa R, Zhang W. (2022) Widespread gene expression pergence in butterfly sensory tissues plays a fundamental role during reproductive isolation and speciation. Mol. Biol. Evol., 39: msac225.
Wang YQ, Fan YY, Fan D, Zhang YB, Zhou XL, Zhang RK, Wang Y, Sun YJ, Zhang W, He YH, Deng XW, Zhu DM. (2022) The Arabidopsis DREAM complex antagonizes WDR5A to modulate histone H3K4me2/3 deposition for a subset of genome repression. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A., 119: e2206075119.
He JW, Zhang R, Yang J, Chang Z, Zhu LX, Lu SH, Xie FA, Mao JL, Dong ZW, Liu GC, Hu P, Dong Y, Wan WT, Zhao RP, Xiong TZ, Leon-Cortes J, Mao CY, Zhang W, Zhan S, Li J, Chen L Wang W, Li XY. (2022) High-quality reference genomes of swallowtail butterflies provide insights into their coloration evolution. Zool. Res., 43: 367-379.
王姝婷，滕德群，张蔚 (2022) 以枯叶蛱蝶属为例揭示山地生物多样性演化和遗传机制。遗传, 44: 731-732.
Zhang YB, Teng DQ, Lu W, Liu M, Zeng H, Cao L, Southcott L, Potdar S, Westerman E, Zhu AJ, Zhang W. (2021) A widely perged locus involved in locomotor adaptation in Heliconius butterflies. Sci. Adv., 7: eabh2340.
Teng DQ, Li FY, Zhang W. (2021) Using comprehensive machine-learning models to classify complex morphological characters. Ecol. Evol., 11: 10421-10431.
Sun TH, Song YZ, Teng DQ, Chen YN, Dai JL, Ma MQ, Zhang W, Pastor-Pareja JC. (2021) Atypical laminin spots and pull-generated microtubule-actin projections mediateDrosophilawing adhesion. Cell Rep., 7: 36: 109667.
Feng YQ, Xu HZ, Liu JH, Xie N, Gao L, He YY, Yao Y, Lv FX, Zhang Y, Lu J, Zhang W, Li CY, Hu XL, Yang ZH, Xiao RP. (2021) Functional and adaptive significance of promoter mutations that affect pergent myocardial expressions ofTRIM72in primates. Mol. Biol. Evol., 38: 2930-945.
Yang J, Wan WT, Xie M, Mao JL, Dong ZW, Lu SH, He JW, Xie FA, Liu GC, Dai XL, Chang Z, Zhao RP, Zhang R, Wang ST, Zhang YM, Zhang W, Wang W, Li XY. (2020) Chromosome-level reference genome assembly and gene editing of the dead-leaf butterflyKallima inachus. Mol. Ecol. Resour., 20: 1080-1092.
Mullen SP, VanKuren NW, Zhang W, Nallu S, Kristiansen EB, Wuyun Q, Liu K, Hill RI, Briscoe AD, Kronforst MR. (2020) Disentangling population history and character evolution among hybridizing lineages. Mol. Biol. Evol. , 37: 1295-1305.
Hong Chen, Yawei Wang, Fan Li, Shuting Wang, Dequn Teng, Yubo Zhang, Juncen Liu, Jiaxin Ni, Peiwen Yang, Yanchen Jiang, Dong Zhao, Weifan Lv, Huize Gao, Junjiayu Yue, Ziang Shi, Yuchang Chen, Ruiqi Hu, Ruijie Liu, Yue Ling, Xijing Qian, Junwei Li, Ao Wang, Jinyu Zhu, Shengheng Mu, Jianwei Zhang, Pinhao Li, Zhenyi Zhou
