GC-biased gene conversion conceals the prediction of the nearly neutral theory in avian genomes.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The nearly neutral theory of molecular evolution predicts that the efficacy of natural selection increases with the effective population size. This prediction has been verified by independent observations in diverse taxa, which show that life-history traits are strongly correlated with measures of the efficacy of selection, such as the d_N/d_S ratio. Surprisingly, avian taxa are an exception to this theory because correlations between life-history traits and d_N/d_S are apparently absent. Here we explore the role of GC-biased gene conversion on estimates of substitution rates as a potential driver of these unexpected observations.

Results

We analyze the relationship between d_N/d_S estimated from alignmen

SUBMITTER: Bolivar P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6322265 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature