Work

The Impact of Founder Events on Chromosomal Variability in Multiply Mating Species

Year: 2008

Type: article

Abstract: In species with heterogametic males, the relative levels of X chromosome versus autosome diversity hold key information about the evolutionary forces at work in a population. It has been shown that population size changes alter the ratio of X linked to autosomal (X/A) variation, with population size reductions and recent bottlenecks leading to decreased X/A diversity ratios. Here we use theory and simulation to investigate a separate demographic effect-that of founder events involving multiply mated females-and find that it leads to much stronger reductions in X/A diversity ratios than are produced by simple population size changes. Investigating the potential of this process to account for sharply reduced X-linked diversity in European Drosophila melanogaster, we find that this model yields predictions that are compatible with the empirical data.

Source: Molecular Biology and Evolution

DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msn124

Authors: J. E. Pool, R. Nielsen

Institution: University of California, Berkeley

Language: English

Topic: Genetic diversity and population structure

Subfield: Genetics

Field: Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

Domain: Life Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funders: National Institute for Health and Care Research, National Institutes of Health, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Human Genome Research Institute

Awards: The use of recombining genetic markers for demographic inference, Dimension Reduction Approaches for Genome-wide Association Testing, G7884159430