Factors driving effective population size and pan-genome evolution in bacteria.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Knowledge of population-level processes is essential to understanding the efficacy of selection operating within a species. However, attempts at estimating effective population sizes (Ne) are particularly challenging in bacteria due to their extremely large census populations sizes, varying rates of recombination and arbitrary species boundaries.

Results

In this study, we estimated Ne for 153 species (152 bacteria and one archaeon) defined under a common framework and found that ecological lifestyle and growth rate were major predictors of Ne; and that contrary to theoretical expectations, Ne was unaffected by recombination rate. Additionally, we found that Ne shapes the evolution and diversity of total gene repertoires of prokaryotic species.

Conclusion

To

SUBMITTER: Bobay LM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6186134 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature