Linked Life Data

20337696

Source:http://linkedlifedata.com/resource/pubmed/id/20337696

Statements in which the resource exists as a subject.
PredicateObject
rdf:type
lifeskim:mentions
pubmed:issue
5
pubmed:dateCreated
2010-6-9
pubmed:abstractText
Sex-dependent selection often leads to spectacularly different phenotypes in males and females. In species in which sexual dimorphism is not complete, it is unclear which benefits females and males derive from displaying a trait that is typical of the other sex. In barn owls (Tyto alba), females exhibit on average larger black eumelanic spots than males but members of the two sexes display this trait in the same range of possible values. In a 12-year study, we show that selection exerted on spot size directly or on genetically correlated traits strongly favoured females with large spots and weakly favoured males with small spots. Intense directional selection on females caused an increase in spot diameter in the population over the study period. This increase is due to a change in the autosomal genes underlying the expression of eumelanic spots but not of sex-linked genes. Female-like males produced more daughters than sons, while male-like females produced more sons than daughters when mated to a small-spotted male. These sex ratio biases appear adaptive because sons of male-like females and daughters of female-like males had above-average survival. This demonstrates that selection exerted against individuals displaying a trait that is typical of the other sex promoted the evolution of specific life history strategies that enhance their fitness. This may explain why in many organisms sexual dimorphism is often not complete.
pubmed:language
eng
pubmed:journal
pubmed:citationSubset
IM
pubmed:chemical
pubmed:status
MEDLINE
pubmed:month
May
pubmed:issn
1461-0248
pubmed:author
pubmed:issnType
Electronic
pubmed:volume
13
pubmed:owner
NLM
pubmed:authorsComplete
Y
pubmed:pagination
616-26
pubmed:dateRevised
2010-11-18
pubmed:meshHeading
pubmed:year
2010
pubmed:articleTitle
Sex-dependent selection on an autosomal melanic female ornament promotes the evolution of sex ratio bias.
pubmed:affiliation
Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Biophore 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland. Alexandre.Roulin@unil.ch
pubmed:publicationType
Journal Article, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't