Twigs on the tree of life? Neutral and selective models for integrating macroevolutionary patterns with microevolutionary processes in the analysis of asexuality.

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_61C71A0E4BD2
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Publication sub-type
Review (review): journal as complete as possible of one specific subject, written based on exhaustive analyses from published work.
Collection
Publications
Title
Twigs on the tree of life? Neutral and selective models for integrating macroevolutionary patterns with microevolutionary processes in the analysis of asexuality.
Journal
Molecular Ecology
Author(s)
Schwander T., Crespi B.J.
ISSN
1365-294X (Electronic)
ISSN-L
0962-1083
Publication state
Published
Issued date
2009
Volume
18
Number
1
Pages
28-42
Language
english
Abstract
Neutral models characterize evolutionary or ecological patterns expected in the absence of specific causal processes, such as natural selection or ecological interactions. In this study, we describe and evaluate three neutral models that can, in principle, help to explain the apparent 'twigginess' of asexual lineages on phylogenetic trees without involving the negative consequences predicted for the absence of recombination and genetic exchange between individuals. Previously, such phylogenetic twiggyness of asexual lineages has been uncritically interpreted as evidence that asexuality is associated with elevated extinction rates and thus represents an evolutionary dead end. Our first model uses simple phylogenetic simulations to illustrate that, with sexual reproduction as the ancestral state, low transition rates to stable asexuality, or low rates of ascertained 'speciation' in asexuals, can generate twiggy distributions of asexuality, in the absence of high extinction rates for asexual lineages. The second model, developed by Janko et al. (2008), shows that a dynamic equilibrium between origins and neutral losses of asexuals can, under some conditions, generate a relatively low mean age of asexual lineages. The third model posits that the risk of extinction for asexual lineages may be higher than that of sexuals simply because asexuals inhabit higher latitudes or altitudes, and not due to effects of their reproductive systems. Such neutral models are useful in that they allow quantitative evaluation of whether empirical data, such as phylogenetic and phylogeographic patterns of sex and asexuality, indeed support the idea that asexually reproducing lineages persist over shorter evolutionary periods than sexual lineages, due to such processes as mutation accumulation, slower rates of adaptive evolution, or relatively lower levels of genetic variability.
Keywords
Animals, Biological Evolution, Genetic Speciation, Models, Genetic, Phylogeny, Reproduction, Asexual/genetics
Pubmed
Web of science
Create date
04/02/2013 10:41
Last modification date
20/08/2019 14:18
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