- THIS ARTICLE
-
Abstract
- Full Text (PDF)
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- SERVICES
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Alert me to new issues of the journal
- Download to citation manager
- Reprints & Permissions
- CITING ARTICLES
- Citing Articles via HighWire
- Citing Articles via Google Scholar
- GOOGLE SCHOLAR
- Articles by Damgaard, C.
- Search for Related Content
- PUBMED
- PubMed Citation
- Articles by Damgaard, C.
Fixation of Advantageous Alleles in Partially Self-Fertilizing Populations: The Effect of Different Selection Modes
Christian Damgaardaa Department of Terrestrial Ecology, National Environmental Research Institute, 8600 Silkeborg, Denmark
Corresponding author: Christian Damgaard, NERI, Vejlsøvej 25, 8600 Silkeborg, Denmark., cfd{at}dmu.dk (E-mail)
Communicating editor: A. H. D. BROWN
| ABSTRACT |
|---|
The expected fixation probability of an advantageous allele was examined in a partially self-fertilizing hermaphroditic plant species using the diffusion approximation. The selective advantage of the advantageous allele was assumed to be increased viability, increased fecundity, or an increase in male fitness. The mode of selection, as well as the selfing rate, the population size, and the dominance of the advantageous allele, affect the fixation probability of the allele. In general it was found that increases in selfing rate decrease the fixation probability under male sexual selection, increase fixation probability under fecundity selection, and increase when recessive and decrease when dominant under viability selection. In some cases the highest fixation probability of advantageous alleles under fecundity or under male sexual selection occurred at an intermediary selfing rate. The expected mean fixation times of the advantageous allele were also examined using the diffusion approximation.
MANY plants are partially self-fertilizing (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
In this study I focus on hermaphroditic plants, i.e., plants with both male and female reproductive organs. Often the two sexes are structurally close together, but the different structures have distinctly different functions and consequently are under different selective pressures (![]()
![]()
![]()
An advantageous allele may affect the different fitness components in different ways. An advantageous "general household" mutation may have a positive effect on plant viability and fecundity (seed production) but has no effect on male sexual selection (e.g., attractiveness to pollinating insects and number of pollen). Conversely, a color mutation that makes the flower more attractive to pollinating insects may have a positive effect on male sexual selection but no effect on viability. Perhaps there may even be a trade-off, so that a mutation that increases attractiveness to pollinating insects and thereby increases male sexual selection also increases the probability that herbivorous insects visit the plant so that viability is reduced.
The fitness components in hermaphroditic plants have been shown to be only loosely correlated. For example, although it is difficult to measure paternal fitness, it seems that fecundity and paternal fitness are not strongly correlated and in some cases are negatively correlated (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
An advantageous allele that either by a mutation, migration, or hybridization event is introduced into a plant population may become fixed in the population. The fixation probability of the advantageous allele depends on the selective advantage of the allele, the coefficient of dominance, the effective population size, and the demography of the population (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
Here, the effect of viability selection is compared with fecundity selection and male sexual selection on the fixation probability and the expected fixation time of an advantageous allele in a partially self-fertilizing plant population.
| MODEL |
|---|
Consider a single locus in a finite partially self-fertilizing hermaphroditic plant population of census size N. The population is a mixed mating Fisher-Wright population, where the number of offspring is Poisson distributed, and a fraction s of new zygotes are produced by self-fertilization and a fraction 1 - s by random mating. The population is assumed to be initially fixed for the allele A2, except for a single copy of a new advantageous mutation A1.
Each generation starts by the production of zygotes from gametes. Before selection, the frequency of the A1 allele among male and female gametes is pm and pf, respectively, and the frequency of the A2 allele among male and female gametes is qm = 1 - pm and qf = 1 - pf, respectively. Assuming weak selection, the population has an equilibrium coefficient of inbreeding F* =
(![]()
![]()
![]()
![]() |
(1) |
where uf = p2f + F*pfqf, vf = 2pfqf - 2F*pfqf, and wf = q2f + F*pfqf. The frequency of the A1 allele in the population before selection takes place is
![]() |
(2) |
Only genotypic selection is assumed to operate in the system, and the relative fitness of the three genotypes A1A1, A1A2, and A2A2 is shown in Table 1. Viability selection is assumed to take place before reproduction and affects both sexes of the hermaphroditic plant equally, fecundity selection operates on the number of seeds produced by the plants, and male sexual selection operates on the number of foreign pollination events taking place, disregarding the pollen needed for selfing events. Note that the term fecundity selection normally includes gametic selection during zygote formation (e.g., ![]()
|
After selection, the frequency of A1 among the male gametes is
![]() |
(3a) |
where u'm = u(1 + sv)(1 + sm), v'm = v(1 + hvsv) (1 + hmsm), and w'm = w. Likewise, after selection, the frequency of A1 among the female gametes is
![]() |
(3b) |
where u'f = u(1 + sv)(1 + sf), v'f = v(1 + hvsv)(1 + hfsf), and w'f = w.
The frequency of the A1 allele among the newly formed zygotes in the next generation, p', can be calculated by inserting p'm and p'f into Equation 2. To express the change in the frequency of the A1 allele, p' - p, by a single variable, p'm is approximated by a function of p'f. The frequency of the advantageous allele among the male gametes is expressed by the ratio between the frequencies in male and female gametes when the advantageous allele is rare:
![]() |
(4) |
This approximation (4) is motivated by the fact that the fate of a positively selected allele is determined when the allele is rare (especially true for dominant alleles or highly selfing populations).
The expected fixation probability and the mean fixation time in a finite population of census size N can be calculated from the expected change in allele frequency, M = p' - p, and the mean variance of the change, V =
, using the diffusion approximation (![]()
![]()
![]() |
(5) |
where G(x) = exp(-
(
)dx) (![]()
![]() |
(6) |
An alternative heuristic approximation of the fixation probability of an advantageous allele under viability selection in a large partially selfing population has been given by ![]()
is the correlation between the frequencies of alleles in the mates.
In the following I show only results from the diffusion approximation Equation 5 and Equation 6, because this approximation is the most precise. Equation 5 and Equation 6 were solved numerically using the NIntegrate procedure in Mathematica (![]()
| RESULTS |
|---|
The expected change in the frequency of the advantageous allele depends on the selection mode, the dominance of the advantageous allele, and the selfing rate (Figure 1). As seen from Equation 3a HREF="#FD3b">Equation 3b, viability selection operates in both sexes, whereas fecundity and male sexual selection operate only in the female and male sexes, respectively; therefore, viability selection is generally more effective than the other two selection modes. When the selfing rate is zero, viability selection is twice as effective as both fecundity and male sexual selection, which have equal effect (Figure 1; due to the approximation in Equation 4, this is exactly the case only for h = 0). However, from Equation 2 it is apparent that, as the selfing rate increases, the importance of the female function increases, and when the selfing rate is one, viability and fecundity selection have the same effect. Conversely, when the selfing rate is increased, the importance of the male function decreases, and when the selfing rate is one, the male sexual selection is without any effect, i.e., the expected change in allele frequency is zero, and the advantageous allele is effectively neutral (Figure 1). To illustrate this, imagine a mutation that increases the amount of pollen by 10% in a wind-pollinated plant species (sm = 0.1) so that a relatively large proportion of the pollen in the male gamete pool has this mutation. Such a mutation may be selectively favored in an outcrossing population, whereas it will be disfavored in a selfing population, because the size of the male gamete pool is without evolutionary importance (providing that there are sufficient pollen grains to effect self-fertilization).
|
When the advantageous allele is recessive, the fixation probability depends critically on the selfing rate because the selective advantage is expressed only in A1A1 homozygotes. Increasing selfing increases the proportion of homozygotes, and the expected change in allele frequency is an increasing function of selfing rate when the advantageous allele is under viability and fecundity selection (Figure 1, h = 0), and the fixation probabilities are increasing functions of selfing rate (Figure 2, h = 0; ![]()
![]()
100, a recessive advantageous allele has a maximal fixation probability at an intermediary selfing rate.
|
The fate of a positively selected dominant allele is determined when the allele is rare (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
100, the advantageous allele has a maximal fixation probability at an intermediary selfing rate.
The case of codominance, h = 0.5, is interesting, because it is a transition point of the functional behavior of the expected change in allele frequency as a function of allele frequency and the fixation probability as a function of selfing rate. When the advantageous allele is codominant, the expected change in allele frequency is highest at the allele frequency 0.5. Whereas, if the allele is recessive and the selfing rate is less than one, the expected change in allele frequency is highest at a frequency >0.5, and if the allele is dominant and the selfing rate is less than one, the expected change in allele frequency is highest at a frequency <0.5 (Figure 1). Correspondingly, when the advantageous allele is codominant, the fixation probability for an advantageous allele under viability selection is the turning point where the fixation probability goes from being an increasing function of selfing rate when the allele is recessive to a decreasing function when the allele is dominant (![]()
![]()
The fixation probability was also calculated for other parameter values than shown in RESULTS. Generally, it can be concluded that the functional relationship of the fixation probability with selfing rate, except for a constant factor, depends only on the combined parameter Nsx, where sx is the selection coefficient. If the fixation probability is expressed relative to the neutral fixation rate (1/2 N), the relative fixation probability is approximately equal for different cases with equal Nsx.
If the different selection modes are combined, the functional dependency of the fixation probability on selfing rate is a mixture of the three selection modes. Generally, viability selection is more important than the other modes of selection, because it is assumed to operate on both male and female gametes, and the influence of male sexual selection decreases with selfing rate.
The probability of fixation depends on the census number of plants in the population as well as on the mating system (Figure 2). Small populations of plants have generally higher fixation probabilities of advantageous alleles compared to larger population sizes (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
In general, it can be concluded that increases in selfing rate decrease the fixation probability under male sexual selection, increase fixation probability under fecundity selection, and increase when recessive and decrease when dominant under viability selection.
The expected fixation times of advantageous alleles under the different selection modes were calculated using the diffusion approximation in Equation 6 (Table 2). For an advantageous allele under viability selection, the expected fixation time in a random mating population increases with the coefficient of dominance, because the larger the effect of the heterozygotes, the longer it takes to lose the unfavorable allele (![]()
![]()
|
The results of the diffusion approximations were checked by stochastic simulations (Table 2). Generally, the diffusion approximations are satisfactory, and the stochastic simulations confirmed the qualitative differences among the fixation probabilities and the expected fixation times for the three selection modes observed using the diffusion approximations. However, there were some cases (denoted by a solid box in Table 2) where the diffusion approximations for most N were outside the 95% confidence interval, and it can be concluded that the diffusion approximation is imprecise for recessive advantageous alleles under viability and fecundity selection in highly selfing populations and for dominant advantageous alleles under fecundity and male sexual selection in outcrossing populations.
| DISCUSSION |
|---|
The mode of selection has previously been shown to have an effect on the evolution of a trait (![]()
![]()
![]()
In this study, only selection forces operating on genotypes (genotypic selection) are considered, and the effect of gametic selection on female and male gametes has not been included. This is motivated by the fact that one of the main effects of selfing is to alter the genotypic proportions toward increased homozygosity. Another effect of selfing is to decrease the importance of the male gamete, so that, in a purely selfing population, alleles expressed only in the male gametes are effectively neutral (![]()
Plant species in a changing environment that fix advantageous alleles more often than others may have an evolutionary advantage, and this may influence the evolution of plant life history characteristics such as selfing rate of the species. Depending on the dominance relationship of new advantageous alleles and the mode of selection, it may be an advantage to be either a selfing or an outcrossing species, and in two cases, a dominant allele under fecundity selection and a recessive allele under male sexual selection, it may be evolutionarily beneficial to have a mixed mating strategy. Likewise, it may be evolutionarily important to fix advantageous alleles quickly, and for most parameter value combinations the expected fixation time decreased with selfing rate, but interestingly, for an advantageous allele under male sexual selection, the smallest fixation time may occur at an intermediary selfing rate. It is important to note that such an evolutionary scenario depends on a group selection mechanism, which has been argued to be a relatively weak evolutionary force (![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
![]()
| ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
|---|
Thanks go to an anonymous reviewer for suggesting the alternative heuristic approximation of the fixation probabilities and also to Bernt Guldbrandtsen, Mikkel Schierup, and two anonymous reviewers for valuable comments and suggestions on a previous version of the manuscript. This research was funded, in part, by the Danish Environmental Research Program and was performed within the Center for Ecological Risk Assessment of Transgenic Plants.
Manuscript received June 16, 1999; Accepted for publication October 1, 1999.
| LITERATURE CITED |
|---|
ALLARD, R. W., S. K. JAIN, and P. L. WORKMAN, 1968 The genetics of inbreeding populations. Adv. Genet. 14:55-131.
BENNETT, J. H. and F. E. BINET, 1956 Association between mendelian factors with mixed selfing and random mating. Heredity 10:51-56.
BODMER, W. F., 1965 Differential fertility in population genetics models. Genetics 51:411-424
CABALLERO, A. and W. G. HILL, 1992a Effective size of nonrandom mating populations. Genetics 130:909-916[Abstract].
CABALLERO, A. and W. G. HILL, 1992b Effects of partial inbreeding on fixation rates and variation of mutant genes. Genetics 131:493-507[Abstract].
CABALLERO, A., A. M. ETHERIDGE, and W. G. HILL, 1992 The time of detection of recessive visible genes with non-random mating. Genet. Res. 62:201-207.
CHARLESWORTH, B., 1992 Evolutionary rates in partially self-fertilizing species. Am. Nat. 140:126-148.
CHARLESWORTH, D. and B. CHARLESWORTH, 1981 Allocation of resources to male and female functions in hermaphrodites. Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 15:57-74.
CHARLESWORTH, D., M. T. MORGAN, and B. CHARLESWORTH, 1990 Inbreeding depression, genetic load, and the evolution of outcrossing rates in a multilocus system with no linkage. Evolution 44:1469-1489.
CRUDEN, R. W. and D. L. LYON, 1985 Patterns of biomass allocation to male and female functions in plants with different mating systems. Oecologia 66:299-306.
CRUDEN, R. W., and D. L. LYON, 1989 Facultative xenogamy: examination of a mixed mating system, pp. 171207 in The Evolutionary Ecology of Plants, edited by J. H. BOCK and Y. B. LINHART. Westview Press, Boulder, CO.
DAMGAARD, C., 1996 Fixation probabilities of selfing rate modifiers in simulations with several deleterious alleles with linkage. Evolution 50:1425-1431.
DAMGAARD, C., 1999 Modelling the spread of disease resistance genes in natural populations, pp. 4345 in Ecological Risks and Prospects of Transgenic Plants. Proceedings From a Conference in Bern 2831 Jan. 1998, edited by K. AMMANN, Y. JACOT, G. KJELLSSON and V. SIMONSEN. Birkhäuser Verlag, Basel, Switzerland.
DAMGAARD, C., B. GULDBRANDTSEN, and F. B. CHRISTIANSEN, 1994 Male gametophytic selection against a deleterious allele in a mixed mating model. Hereditas 120:13-18.
EWENS, W. J., 1963 The diffusion equation and a pseudo-distribution in genetics. J. R. Stat. Soc. B 25:405-412.
EWENS, W. J., 1969 Population Genetics. Methuen, London.
FELDMAN, M. W., F. B. CHRISTIANSEN, and U. LIBERMAN, 1983 On some models of fertility selection. Genetics 105:1003-1010
GREGORIUS, H.-R., 1982 Selection in plant populations of effectively infinite size. II. Protectedness of a biallelic polymorphism. J. Theor. Biol. 96:689-705.
HALDANE, J. B. S., 1924 A mathematical theory of natural and artificial selection. Part II. Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. Biol. Sci. 1:158-163.
HALDANE, J. B. S., 1927 A mathematical theory of natural and artificial selection. V. Selection and mutation. Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. 23:838-844.
HOLSINGER, K. E., 1992 Ecological models of plant reproduction and the evolutionary stability of mixed mating systems, pp. 169191 in Ecology and Evolution of Plant Reproduction: New Approaches, edited by R. W. WYATT. Chapman and Hall, New York.
KIMURA, M., 1962 On the probability of fixation of mutant genes in a population. Genetics 47:713-719
KJÆR, C., C. DAMGAARD, G. KJELLSSON, B. STRANDBERG and M. STRANDBERG, 1999 Ecological Risk Assessment of Genetically Modified Higher Plants (GMHP)Identification of Data Needs. National Environmental Research Institute, Denmark.
LEWONTIN, R. C., 1970 The units of selection. Rev. Ecol. Syst. 1:1-18.
LLOYD, D. G. and K. S. BAWA, 1984 Modification of the gender of seed plants in varying conditions. Evol. Biol. 17:255-338.
MAZER, S. J., 1987 Parental effects on seed development and seed yield in Raphanus raphanistrum: implications for natural and sexual selection. Evolution 41:355-371.
NORDBORG, M. and P. DONNELLY, 1997 The coalescent process with selfing. Genetics 146:1185-1195[Abstract].
OHTA, T. and C. C. COCKERHAM, 1974 Detrimental genes with partial selfing and effects on a neutral locus. Genet. Res. 23:191-200[Medline].
OTTO, S. P. and M. C. WHITLOCK, 1997 The probability of fixation in populations of changing size. Genetics 146:723-733[Abstract].
POLLAK, E. and M. SABRAN, 1992 On the theory of partially inbreeding finite population. III. Fixation probabilities under partial selfing when heterozygotes are intermediate in viability. Genetics 131:979-985[Abstract].
ROSS, M., 1990 Sexual asymmetry in hermaphroditic plants. Trends Ecol. Evol. 5:43-47.
SCHEMSKE, D. W. and R. LANDE, 1985 The evolution of self-fertilization and inbreeding depression in plants. II. Empirical observations. Evolution 39:41-52.
SCHLICHTING, C. D. and B. DEVLIN, 1989 Male and female reproductive success in the hemaphroditic plant Phlox drummondii.. Am. Nat. 133:212-227.
STEPHENSON, A. G., and R. I. BERTIN, 1983 Male competition, female choice, and sexual selection in plants, pp. 109149 in Pollination Biology, edited by L. REAL. Academic Press, New York.
UYENOYAMA, M. K. and D. M. WALLER, 1991 Coevolution of self-fertilisation and inbreeding depression. I. Mutation-selection balance at one and two loci. Theor. Popul. Biol. 40:14-46[Medline].
WOLFRAM, S., 1996 The Mathematica Book. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
WRIGHT, S., 1969 Evolution and the Genetics of Populations. Vol. 2. The Theory of Gene Frequencies. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
This article has been cited by other articles:
![]() |
S. V. Good-Avila, T. Nagel, D. W. Vogler, and A. G. Stephenson Effects of inbreeding on male function and self-fertility in the partially self-incompatible herb Campanula rapunculoides (Campanulaceae) Am. J. Botany, December 1, 2003; 90(12): 1736 - 1745. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
||||
- THIS ARTICLE
-
Abstract
- Full Text (PDF)
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- SERVICES
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Alert me to new issues of the journal
- Download to citation manager
- Reprints & Permissions
- CITING ARTICLES
- Citing Articles via HighWire
- Citing Articles via Google Scholar
- GOOGLE SCHOLAR
- Articles by Damgaard, C.
- Search for Related Content
- PUBMED
- PubMed Citation
- Articles by Damgaard, C.











