Additive Traits Lead to Feeding Advantage and Reproductive Isolation, Promoting Homoploid Hybrid Speciation.

ABSTRACT: Speciation through homoploid hybridization (HHS) is considered extremely rare in animals. This is mainly because the establishment of reproductive isolation as a product of hybridization is uncommon. Additionally, many traits are underpinned by polygeny and/or incomplete dominance, where the hybrid phenotype is an additive blend of parental characteristics. Phenotypically intermediate hybrids are usually at a fitness disadvantage compared with parental species and tend to vanish through backcrossing with parental population(s). It is therefore unknown whether the additive nature of hybrid traits in itself could lead successfully to HHS. Using a multi-marker genetic data set and a meta-analysis of diet and morphology, we investigated a potential case of HHS in the prions (Pachyptila spp.),

SUBMITTER: Masello JF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6657733 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature