Meiotic Drive Impacts Expression and Evolution of X-Linked Genes in Stalk-Eyed Flies

作者：Reinhardt Josephine A^*; Brand Cara L; Paczolt Kimberly A; Johns Philip M; Baker Richard H; Wilkinson Gerald S

来源：PLoS Genetics, 2014, 10(5): e1004362.

DOI：10.1371/journal.pgen.1004362

Although sex chromosome meiotic drive has been observed in a variety of species for over 50 years, the genes causing drive are only known in a few cases, and none of these cases cause distorted sex-ratios in nature. In stalk-eyed flies (Teleopsis dalmanni), driving X chromosomes are commonly found at frequencies approaching 30% in the wild, but the genetic basis of drive has remained elusive due to reduced recombination between driving and non-driving X chromosomes. Here, we used RNAseq to identify transcripts that are differentially expressed between males carrying either a driving X (X-SR) or a standard X chromosome (X-ST), and found hundreds of these, the majority of which are X-linked. Drive-associated transcripts show increased levels of sequence divergence (dN/dS) compared to a control set, and are predominantly expressed either in testes or in the gonads of both sexes. Finally, we confirmed that X-SR and X-ST are highly divergent by estimating sequence differentiation between the RNAseq pools. We found that X-linked transcripts were often strongly differentiated (whereas most autosomal transcripts were not), supporting the presence of a relatively large region of recombination suppression on X-SR presumably caused by one or more inversions. We have identified a group of genes that are good candidates for further study into the causes and consequences of sex-chromosome drive, and demonstrated that meiotic drive has had a profound effect on sequence evolution and gene expression of X-linked genes in this species.

• 出版日期2014-5