Genetic mechanism of body size variation in groupers: Insights from phylotranscriptomics.

ABSTRACT: Animal body size variation is of particular interest in evolutionary biology, but the genetic basis remains largely unknown. Previous studies have shown the presence of two parallel evolutionary genetic clusters within the fish genus Epinephelus with evident divergence in body size, providing an excellent opportunity to investigate the genetic basis of body size variation in vertebrates. Herein, we performed phylotranscriptomic analysis and reconstructed the phylogeny of 13 epinephelids originating from the South China Sea. Two genetic clades with an estimated divergence time of approximately 15.4 million years ago were correlated with large and small body size, respectively. A total of 180 rapidly evolving genes and two positively selected genes were identified between the two grou

SUBMITTER: Zhang WW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11017090 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature