Abstract
The fully sequenced genomes of five species within the Saccharomyces sensustricto complex provided a wealth of information for molecular-evolutionary inference. Yet virtually little thing was known about population-genetic variation within these species, including the molecular-biological and genetic-model organism S. cerevisiae. Here we investigated the population genetic variation and population structure of S. cerevisiae by analyzing the sequence of the MF(alpha)1 loci in 41 strains. Sequence analysis demonstrated a distinct population structure in S. cerevisiae, distinguishing strain collected from Kunming grape juice and other strains. Our findings indicated that strains clustered together might mainly due to ecological rather than geographic factors.