Better Fitness in Captive Cuvier's Gazelle despite Inbreeding Increase: Evidence of Purging?

ABSTRACT: Captive breeding of endangered species often aims at preserving genetic diversity and to avoid the harmful effects of inbreeding. However, deleterious alleles causing inbreeding depression can be purged when inbreeding persists over several generations. Despite its great importance both for evolutionary biology and for captive breeding programmes, few studies have addressed whether and to which extent purging may occur. Here we undertake a longitudinal study with the largest captive population of Cuvier's gazelle managed under a European Endangered Species Programme since 1975. Previous results in this population have shown that highly inbred mothers tend to produce more daughters, and this fact was used in 2006 to reach a more appropriate sex-ratio in this polygynous species by changing t

SUBMITTER: Moreno E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4682998 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature