Similarity selection and the evolution of sex: revisiting the red queen.

ABSTRACT: For over 25 years, many evolutionary ecologists have believed that sexual reproduction occurs because it allows hosts to change genotypes each generation and thereby evade their coevolving parasites. However, recent influential theoretical analyses suggest that, though parasites can select for sex under some conditions, they often select against it. These models assume that encounters between hosts and parasites are completely random. Because of this assumption, the fitness of a host depends only on its own genotype ("genotypic selection"). If a host is even slightly more likely to encounter a parasite transmitted by its mother than expected by random chance, then the fitness of a host also depends on its genetic similarity to its mother ("similarity selection"). A population genetic model

SUBMITTER: Agrawal AF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1523229 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature