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Slow evolution of sex-biased genes in the reproductive tissue of the dioecious plant Salix viminalis

Darolti, I; Wright, AE; Pucholt, P; Berlin, S; Mank, JE; (2018) Slow evolution of sex-biased genes in the reproductive tissue of the dioecious plant Salix viminalis. Molecular Ecology , 27 (3) pp. 694-708. 10.1111/mec.14466. Green open access

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Abstract

The relative rate of evolution for sex-biased genes has often been used as a measure of the strength of sex-specific selection. In contrast to studies in a wide variety of animals, far less is known about the molecular evolution of sex-biased genes in plants, particularly in dioecious angiosperms. Here, we investigate the gene expression patterns and evolution of sex-biased genes in the dioecious plant Salix viminalis. We observe lower rates of sequence evolution for male-biased genes expressed in the reproductive tissue compared to unbiased and female-biased genes. These results could be partially explained by the lower codon usage bias for male-biased genes leading to elevated rates of synonymous substitutions compared to unbiased genes. However, the stronger haploid selection in the reproductive tissue of plants, together with pollen competition, would also lead to higher levels of purifying selection acting to remove deleterious variation. Future work should focus on the differential evolution of haploid- and diploid-specific genes in order to understand the selective dynamics acting on these loci. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Type: Article
Title: Slow evolution of sex-biased genes in the reproductive tissue of the dioecious plant Salix viminalis
Location: England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1111/mec.14466
Publisher version: http://doi.org/10.1111/mec.14466
Language: English
Additional information: © 2017 The Authors. Molecular Ecology Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Keywords: Sex-biased gene expression; codon usage bias; sexual selection; dioecious angiosperms
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences > Genetics, Evolution and Environment
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10040750
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