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Originally published as Genetics Published Articles Ahead of Print on May 4, 2007.

Genetics, Vol. 176, 1653-1661, July 2007, Copyright © 2007
doi:10.1534/genetics.107.074666

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Mutational Bias for Body Size in Rhabditid Nematodes

Dejerianne Ostrow, Naomi Phillips1, Arián Avalos, Dustin Blanton, Ashley Boggs, Thomas Keller2, Laura Levy, Jeffrey Rosenbloom and Charles F. Baer3

Department of Zoology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611-8525

3 Corresponding author: Department of Zoology, University of Florida, P.O. Box 118525, Gainesville, FL 32611-8525.
E-mail: cbaer{at}zoo.ufl.edu

Mutational bias is a potentially important agent of evolution, but it is difficult to disentangle the effects of mutation from those of natural selection. Mutation-accumulation experiments, in which mutations are allowed to accumulate at very small population size, thus minimizing the efficiency of natural selection, are the best way to separate the effects of mutation from those of selection. Body size varies greatly among species of nematode in the family rhabditidae; mutational biases are both a potential cause and a consequence of that variation. We report data on the cumulative effects of mutations that affect body size in three species of rhabditid nematode that vary fivefold in adult size. Results are very consistent with previous studies of mutations underlying fitness in the same strains: two strains of Caenorhabditis briggsae decline in body size about twice as fast as two strains of C. elegans, with a concomitant higher point estimate of the genomic mutation rate; the confamilial Oscheius myriophila is intermediate. There is an overall mutational bias, such that mutations reduce size on average, but the bias appears consistent between species. The genetic correlation between mutations that affect size and those underlying fitness is large and positive, on average.




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C. G. Artieri, W. Haerty, B. P. Gupta, and R. S. Singh
Sexual Selection and Maintenance of Sex: Evidence from Comparisons of Rates of Genomic Accumulation of Mutations and Divergence of Sex-Related Genes in Sexual and Hermaphroditic Species of Caenorhabditis
Mol. Biol. Evol., May 1, 2008; 25(5): 972 - 979.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


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