PhD Studentship: Investigating the Viability of a Mainland Re-introduction of the Glanville Fritillary Butterfly: A Genomic and Habitat Viability Assessment

(a) The questions. Britain's Glanville fritillary (Melitaea cinxia) is restricted to a single metapopulation on the Isle of Wight, repeatedly bottlenecked and probably among Europe's most genetically depauperate butterfly populations. Has inbreeding depression reached a level that limits viability? Which source populations would restore genetic variation without eroding local adaptation? And can genetically informed founders establish a self-sustaining population at a new site? Conservation translocation is expanding across England, yet source populations are still chosen with little genetic evidence.

(b) Methods. The researcher will sequence butterfly genomes from the Isle of Wight and from populations in the Channel Islands, Normandy and Åland to estimate population genetic diversity, inbreeding and genetic load. Experimental crosses among individuals between populations will test whether admixed offspring show improved performance. Larval survival depends on the availability of fine-scale warm microclimates; drone surveys will assess the suitability of potential reintroduction sites on the mainland against the thermal requirements identified by Curtis on the Isle of Wight. These complementary datasets will determine whether genetic rescue of the Glanville fritillary is feasible and inform the development of a protocol for reintroducing a rescued population on the mainland, where the species historically occurred.

(c) Training. Bilde and Orozco-terWengel train the researcher in population genetics, bioinformatics and conservation. Alford supervises in thermal ecology and physiology, and Curtis in field methods and drone imaging. Writing is staged from the first-year review to lead-authored papers.

(d) Collaboration. The supervisors have complementary expertise: conservation genomics and population recovery (Bilde and Orozco-terWengel), field ecology (Curtis), and thermal physiology (Alford). Through integrative collaboration, the researcher will learn to generate and analyse whole-genome data, design and run breeding experiments, and survey habitats in the field, following a single question from genome to habitat and covering the breadth of disciplines that conservation genomics now requires.

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