A Practical Guide to Estimating the Heritability of Pathogen Traits.

ABSTRACT: Pathogen traits, such as the virulence of an infection, can vary significantly between patients. A major challenge is to measure the extent to which genetic differences between infecting strains explain the observed variation of the trait. This is quantified by the trait's broad-sense heritability, H2. A recent discrepancy between estimates of the heritability of HIV-virulence has opened a debate on the estimators' accuracy. Here, we show that the discrepancy originates from model limitations and important lifecycle differences between sexually reproducing organisms and transmittable pathogens. In particular, current quantitative genetics methods, such as donor-recipient regression of surveyed serodiscordant couples and the phylogenetic mixed model (PMM), are prone to underestimate H2, bec

SUBMITTER: Mitov V 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5850476 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature