Nucleotide diversity in Silene latifolia autosomal and sex-linked genes.

ABSTRACT: The plant Silene latifolia has separate sexes and sex chromosomes, and is of interest for studying the early stages of sex chromosome evolution, especially the evolution of non-recombining regions on the Y chromosome. Hitch-hiking processes associated with ongoing genetic degeneration of the non-recombining Y chromosome are predicted to reduce Y-linked genes' effective population sizes, and S. latifolia Y-linked genes indeed have lower diversity than X-linked ones. We tested whether this represents a true diversity reduction on the Y, versus the alternative possibility, elevated diversity at X-linked genes, by collecting new data on nucleotide diversity for autosomal genes, which had previously been little studied. We find clear evidence that Y-linked genes have reduced diversity. However,

SUBMITTER: Qiu S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2981921 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature