Abstract
We performed a large-scale experiment on the effects of inbreeding and population bottlenecks on the additive genetic and environmental variance for morphological traits in Drosophila melanogaster. Fifty-two inbred lines were created from the progeny of single pairs, and 90 parent-offspring families on average were measured in each of these lines for six wing size and shape traits, as well as 1945 families from the outbred population from which the lines were derived. The amount of additive genetic variance has been observed to increase after such population bottlenecks in other studies; in contrast here the mean change in additive genetic variance was in very good agreement with classical additive theory, decreasing proportionally to the inbreeding coefficient of the lines. The residual, probably environmental, variance increased on average after inbreeding. Both components of variance were highly variable among inbred lines, with increases and decreases recorded for both. The variance among lines in the residual variance provides some evidence for a genetic basis of developmental stability. Changes in the phenotypic variance of these traits are largely due to changes in the genetic variance.
Full Text
The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (115.2 KB).
Selected References
These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.
- Avery P. J., Hill W. G. Variability in genetic parameters among small populations. Genet Res. 1977 Jun;29(3):193–213. doi: 10.1017/s0016672300017286. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Bryant E. H., McCommas S. A., Combs L. M. The Effect of an Experimental Bottleneck upon Quantitative Genetic Variation in the Housefly. Genetics. 1986 Dec;114(4):1191–1211. doi: 10.1093/genetics/114.4.1191. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Cockerham C. C., Tachida H. Permanency of response to selection for quantitative characters in finite populations. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1988 Mar;85(5):1563–1565. doi: 10.1073/pnas.85.5.1563. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- GRUNEBERG H. Variation within inbred strains of mice. Nature. 1954 Apr 10;173(4406):674–676. doi: 10.1038/173674a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Kondrashov A. S., Houle D. Genotype-environment interactions and the estimation of the genomic mutation rate in Drosophila melanogaster. Proc Biol Sci. 1994 Dec 22;258(1353):221–227. doi: 10.1098/rspb.1994.0166. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Lynch M. Design and analysis of experiments on random drift and inbreeding depression. Genetics. 1988 Nov;120(3):791–807. doi: 10.1093/genetics/120.3.791. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- McLAREN A., MICHIE D. Are inbred strains suitable for bio-assay? Nature. 1954 Apr 10;173(4406):686–687. doi: 10.1038/173686b0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Meffert L. M. Bottleneck effects on genetic variance for courtship repertoire. Genetics. 1995 Jan;139(1):365–374. doi: 10.1093/genetics/139.1.365. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Robertson A. The Effect of Inbreeding on the Variation Due to Recessive Genes. Genetics. 1952 Mar;37(2):189–207. doi: 10.1093/genetics/37.2.189. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- SHELDON B. L., RENDEL J. M., FINLAY D. E. THE EFFECT OF HOMOZYGOSITY ON DEVELOPMENTAL STABILITY. Genetics. 1964 Mar;49:471–484. doi: 10.1093/genetics/49.3.471. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Tachida H., Cockerham C. C. A building block model for quantitative genetics. Genetics. 1989 Apr;121(4):839–844. doi: 10.1093/genetics/121.4.839. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Tachida H., Cockerham C. C. Quantitative genetic variation in an ecological setting. Theor Popul Biol. 1987 Dec;32(3):393–429. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(87)90057-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Whitlock M. C. Two-locus drift with sex chromosomes: the partitioning and conversion of variance in subdivided populations. Theor Popul Biol. 1995 Aug;48(1):44–64. doi: 10.1006/tpbi.1995.1021. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]