Emergence of male-biased genes on the chicken Z-chromosome: sex-chromosome contrasts between male and female heterogametic systems.

ABSTRACT: There has been extensive traffic of male-biased genes out of the mammalian and Drosophila X-chromosomes, and there are also reports of an under-representation of male-biased genes on the X. This may reflect an adaptive process driven by natural selection where an autosomal location of male-biased genes is favored since male genes are only exposed to selection one-third of the time when X-linked. However, there are several alternative explanations to "out-of-the-X" gene movement, including mutational bias and a means for X-linked genes to escape meiotic sex chromosome inactivation (MSCI) during spermatogenesis. As a critical test of the hypothesis that genomic relocation of sex-biased genes is an adaptive process, I examined the emergence, and loss, of genes on the chicken Z-chromosome, i.e

SUBMITTER: Ellegren H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3227098 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature