Colnaghi, M;
Lane, N;
Pomiankowski, A;
(2020)
Genome expansion in early eukaryotes drove the transition from lateral gene transfer to meiotic sex.
eLife
, 9
, Article e58873. 10.7554/eLife.58873.
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Abstract
Prokaryotes acquire genes from the environment via lateral gene transfer (LGT). Recombination of environmental DNA can prevent the accumulation of deleterious mutations, but LGT was abandoned by the first eukaryotes in favour of sexual reproduction. Here we develop a theoretical model of a haploid population undergoing LGT which includes two new parameters, genome size and recombination length, neglected by previous theoretical models. The greater complexity of eukaryotes is linked with larger genomes and we demonstrate that the benefit of LGT declines rapidly with genome size. The degeneration of larger genomes can only be resisted by increases in recombination length, to the same order as genome size – as occurs in meiosis. Our results can explain the strong selective pressure towards the evolution of sexual cell fusion and reciprocal recombination during early eukaryotic evolution – the origin of meiotic sex.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Genome expansion in early eukaryotes drove the transition from lateral gene transfer to meiotic sex |
| Location: | England |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.7554/eLife.58873 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.58873 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © 2020, Colnaghi et al. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited. |
| 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/10111484 |
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