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The consequences of mating over a range of parental genetic similarity in a selfing allopolyploid plant species
Author(s) -
VANDEPITTE K.,
JACQUEMYN H.,
ROLDÁNRUIZ I.,
HONNAY O.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of evolutionary biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.289
H-Index - 128
eISSN - 1420-9101
pISSN - 1010-061X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1420-9101.2011.02390.x
Subject(s) - selfing , biology , outbreeding depression , inbreeding depression , heterosis , inbreeding , mating , range (aeronautics) , evolutionary biology , mating system , offspring , genetics , hybrid , botany , population , demography , pregnancy , materials science , sociology , composite material
In diploids, F 1 offspring performance is expected to increase with increasing genetic dissimilarity between the parents until an optimum is reached because outbreeding mitigates inbreeding depression and maximizes heterosis. However, many flowering plant species are derived through allopolyploidization, i.e. interspecific hybridization with genome doubling. This mode of plant speciation can be expected to considerably alter the consequences of inbreeding and outbreeding. We investigated the F1 fitness consequences of mating over a range of (genetic) distances in the allohexaploid plant species Geum urbanum . Offspring was raised under controlled conditions (632 plants). The performance of outcrossed progeny was not significantly better than that of their selfed half‐siblings and did not increase with parental genetic dissimilarity (0–0.83). Our findings support low, if any, inbreeding depression and heterosis. We attribute this to the peculiar state of quasi‐permanent heterozygosity in allopolyploids and frequent selfing.