Dataset Information

Genomic Signature of Kin Selection in an Ant with Obligately Sterile Workers.

ABSTRACT: Kin selection is thought to drive the evolution of cooperation and conflict, but the specific genes and genome-wide patterns shaped by kin selection are unknown. We identified thousands of genes associated with the sterile ant worker caste, the archetype of an altruistic phenotype shaped by kin selection, and then used population and comparative genomic approaches to study patterns of molecular evolution at these genes. Consistent with population genetic theoretical predictions, worker-upregulated genes experienced reduced selection compared with genes upregulated in reproductive castes. Worker-upregulated genes included more taxonomically restricted genes, indicating that the worker caste has recruited more novel genes, yet these genes also experienced reduced selection. Our study identifies a putative genomic signature of kin selection and helps to integrate emerging sociogenomic data with longstanding social evolution theory.

SUBMITTER: Warner MR

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5455959 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Genomic Signature of Kin Selection in an Ant with Obligately Sterile Workers.

Warner Michael R MR Mikheyev Alexander S AS Linksvayer Timothy A TA

Molecular biology and evolution 20170701 7

Kin selection is thought to drive the evolution of cooperation and conflict, but the specific genes and genome-wide patterns shaped by kin selection are unknown. We identified thousands of genes associated with the sterile ant worker caste, the archetype of an altruistic phenotype shaped by kin selection, and then used population and comparative genomic approaches to study patterns of molecular evolution at these genes. Consistent with population genetic theoretical predictions, worker-upregulat ...[more]

PMID: 28419349

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Project description:The majority of empirical population genetic studies have tried to understand the evolutionary processes that have shaped genetic variation in a single sample taken from a present-day population. However, genomic data collected over tens of generations in both natural and laboratory populations are increasingly used to find selected loci underpinning adaptation over these short timescales. Although these studies have been quite successful in detecting selection on large-effect loci, the fitness differences between individuals are often polygenic, such that selection leads to allele frequency changes that are difficult to distinguish from genetic drift. However, one promising signal comes from polygenic selection's effect on neutral sites that become stochastically associated with the genetic backgrounds that lead to fitness differences between individuals. Previous theoretical work has established that the random associations between a neutral allele and heritable fitness backgrounds act to reduce the effective population size experienced by this neutral allele. These associations perturb neutral allele frequency trajectories, creating autocovariance in the allele frequency changes across generations. Here, we show how temporal genomic data allow us to measure the temporal autocovariance in allele frequency changes and characterize the genome-wide impact of polygenic selection. We develop expressions for these temporal autocovariances, showing that their magnitude is determined by the level of additive genetic variation, recombination, and linkage disequilibria in a region. Furthermore, by using analytic expressions for the temporal variances and autocovariances in allele frequency, we demonstrate that one can estimate the additive genetic variation for fitness and the drift-effective population size from temporal genomic data. We also show how the proportion of total variation in allele frequency change due to linked selection can be estimated from temporal data. Overall, we demonstrate that temporal genomic data offer opportunities to identify the role of linked selection on genome-wide diversity over short timescales, and can help bridge population genetic and quantitative genetic studies of adaptation.

Dataset Information

Genomic Signature of Kin Selection in an Ant with Obligately Sterile Workers.

Publications

Genomic Signature of Kin Selection in an Ant with Obligately Sterile Workers.

Similar Datasets

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