Premium
VARIATION IN PLEIOTROPY AND THE MUTATIONAL UNDERPINNINGS OF THE G ‐MATRIX
Author(s) -
Estes Suzanne,
Phillips Patrick C.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
evolution
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.84
H-Index - 199
eISSN - 1558-5646
pISSN - 0014-3820
DOI - 10.1111/j.0014-3820.2006.tb01897.x
Subject(s) - biology , pleiotropy , genetics , evolutionary biology , mutation accumulation , selection (genetic algorithm) , covariance , mutation , univariate , population , genetic variation , epistasis , phenotype , gene , mutation rate , multivariate statistics , statistics , mathematics , demography , artificial intelligence , sociology , computer science
The pattern and extent of pleiotropic gene action can contribute substantially to the internal structure and shape of the additive genetic variance‐covariance matrix (G)–a key determinant of evolutionary trajectories. We use data from our study (Estes et al. 2004) on the univariate effects of mutation in a mismatch‐repair‐defective strain, msh‐2, of Caenorhabditis elegans to address the impact of increasing levels of selection on the magnitude and pattern of genetic covariance due to new mutations. Mutational covariances between three life‐history traits are shown to exhibit a weak pattern of decline with increasing population size (increasing selection), while the orientation of mutational matrices remains reasonably constant. This suggests that mutations with smaller effects on fitness may tend to be slightly more confined in their influence than large‐effect mutations (i.e., small‐effect mutations reduce the magnitude of covariation between characters), but do not change the direction of this covariation.