Wolbachia-induced unidirectional cytoplasmic incompatibility and speciation: mainland-island model.

ABSTRACT: Bacteria of the genus Wolbachia are among the most common endosymbionts in the world. In many insect species these bacteria induce a sperm-egg incompatibility between the gametes of infected males and uninfected females, commonly called unidirectional cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI). It is generally believed that unidirectional CI cannot promote speciation in hosts because infection differences between populations will be unstable and subsequent gene flow will eliminate genetic differences between diverging populations. In the present study we investigate this question theoretically in a mainland-island model with migration from mainland to island. Our analysis shows that (a) the infection polymorphism is stable below a critical migration rate, (b) an (initially) uninfected "island" can b

SUBMITTER: Telschow A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1934337 | biostudies-literature | 2007 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature