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Inbreeding depression across a nutritional stress continuum

Schou, M F LU ; Loeschcke, V and Kristensen, T N (2015) In Heredity 115(1). p.56-62
Abstract
Many natural populations experience inbreeding and genetic drift as a consequence of nonrandom mating or low population size. Furthermore, they face environmental challenges that may interact synergistically with deleterious consequences of increased homozygosity and further decrease fitness. Most studies on inbreeding–environment (I-E) interactions use one or two stress levels, whereby the resolution of the possible stress and inbreeding depression interaction is low. Here we produced Drosophila melanogaster replicate populations, maintained at three different population sizes (10, 50 and a control size of 500) for 25 generations. A nutritional stress gradient was imposed on the replicate populations by exposing them to 11 different... (More)
Many natural populations experience inbreeding and genetic drift as a consequence of nonrandom mating or low population size. Furthermore, they face environmental challenges that may interact synergistically with deleterious consequences of increased homozygosity and further decrease fitness. Most studies on inbreeding–environment (I-E) interactions use one or two stress levels, whereby the resolution of the possible stress and inbreeding depression interaction is low. Here we produced Drosophila melanogaster replicate populations, maintained at three different population sizes (10, 50 and a control size of 500) for 25 generations. A nutritional stress gradient was imposed on the replicate populations by exposing them to 11 different concentrations of yeast in the developmental medium. We assessed the consequences of nutritional stress by scoring egg-to-adult viability and body mass of emerged flies. We found: (1) unequivocal evidence for I-E interactions in egg-to-adult viability and to a lesser extent in dry body mass, with inbreeding depression being more severe under higher levels of nutritional stress; (2) a steeper increase in inbreeding depression for replicate populations of size 10 with increasing nutritional stress than for replicate populations of size 50; (3) a nonlinear norm of reaction between inbreeding depression and nutritional stress; and (4) a faster increase in number of lethal equivalents in replicate populations of size 10 compared with replicate populations of size 50 with increasing nutritional stress levels. Our data provide novel and strong evidence that deleterious fitness consequences of I-E interactions are more pronounced at higher nutritional stress and at higher inbreeding levels. (Less)
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author
; and
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
animal breeding, evolutionary genetics, genetic variation
in
Heredity
volume
115
issue
1
pages
7 pages
publisher
Macmillan
external identifiers
  • scopus:84930869744
ISSN
0018-067X
DOI
10.1038/hdy.2015.16
language
English
LU publication?
no
id
26a5f301-45c3-4047-80f0-debc98e0fe1c
date added to LUP
2017-12-18 09:44:21
date last changed
2022-04-25 04:34:57
@article{26a5f301-45c3-4047-80f0-debc98e0fe1c,
  abstract     = {{Many natural populations experience inbreeding and genetic drift as a consequence of nonrandom mating or low population size. Furthermore, they face environmental challenges that may interact synergistically with deleterious consequences of increased homozygosity and further decrease fitness. Most studies on inbreeding–environment (I-E) interactions use one or two stress levels, whereby the resolution of the possible stress and inbreeding depression interaction is low. Here we produced Drosophila melanogaster replicate populations, maintained at three different population sizes (10, 50 and a control size of 500) for 25 generations. A nutritional stress gradient was imposed on the replicate populations by exposing them to 11 different concentrations of yeast in the developmental medium. We assessed the consequences of nutritional stress by scoring egg-to-adult viability and body mass of emerged flies. We found: (1) unequivocal evidence for I-E interactions in egg-to-adult viability and to a lesser extent in dry body mass, with inbreeding depression being more severe under higher levels of nutritional stress; (2) a steeper increase in inbreeding depression for replicate populations of size 10 with increasing nutritional stress than for replicate populations of size 50; (3) a nonlinear norm of reaction between inbreeding depression and nutritional stress; and (4) a faster increase in number of lethal equivalents in replicate populations of size 10 compared with replicate populations of size 50 with increasing nutritional stress levels. Our data provide novel and strong evidence that deleterious fitness consequences of I-E interactions are more pronounced at higher nutritional stress and at higher inbreeding levels.}},
  author       = {{Schou, M F and Loeschcke, V and Kristensen, T N}},
  issn         = {{0018-067X}},
  keywords     = {{animal breeding; evolutionary genetics; genetic variation}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{1}},
  pages        = {{56--62}},
  publisher    = {{Macmillan}},
  series       = {{Heredity}},
  title        = {{Inbreeding depression across a nutritional stress continuum}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/hdy.2015.16}},
  doi          = {{10.1038/hdy.2015.16}},
  volume       = {{115}},
  year         = {{2015}},
}