Inbreeding avoidance, tolerance, or preference in animals?

Szulkin, Marta; Stopher, Katie V.; Pemberton, Josephine M.; Reid, Jane M.

doi:10.1016/j.tree.2012.10.016

Cited by 182 publications

(260 citation statements)

References 73 publications

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“…The buffering effects of parental care on offspring fitness may interact with lifehistory traits and mating dynamics to determine an organism's inbreeding strategy, which in turn can have profound implications for the maintenance of genetic variation within a population (5,6). Considering the wider implications of the potential effects of parental care on the severity of inbreeding depression may thus help us better understand and predict when animals should avoid, tolerate, or prefer inbreeding (5).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…parental care | environmental stress | fitness | inbreeding depression | inbreeding tolerance I nbreeding is an important issue in evolutionary biology and ecology because of its profound implications for genetic variation and the evolution of mating systems and reproductive strategies (1)(2)(3)(4)(5). Inbreeding results from matings between related individuals and can cause a reduction in offspring fitness because the higher degree of homozygosity associated with inbreeding increases the risk that deleterious recessive alleles are expressed (6).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Parental care buffers against inbreeding depression in burying beetles

Pilakouta

Jamieson

Moorad

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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When relatives mate, their inbred offspring often suffer a reduction in fitness-related traits known as "inbreeding depression." There is mounting evidence that inbreeding depression can be exacerbated by environmental stresses such as starvation, predation, parasitism, and competition. Parental care may play an important role as a buffer against inbreeding depression in the offspring by alleviating these environmental stresses. Here, we examine the effect of parental care on the fitness costs of inbreeding in the burying beetle Nicrophorus vespilloides, an insect with facultative parental care. We used a 2 × 2 factorial design with the following factors: (i) the presence or absence of a caring female parent during larval development and (ii) inbred or outbred offspring. We examined the joint influence of maternal care and inbreeding status on fitness-related offspring traits to test the hypothesis that maternal care improves the performance of inbred offspring more than that of outbred offspring. Indeed, the female's presence led to a higher increase in larval survival in inbred than in outbred broods. Receiving care at the larval stage also increased the lifespan of inbred but not outbred adults, suggesting that the beneficial buffering effects of maternal care can persist long after the offspring have become independent. Our results show that parental care has the potential to moderate the severity of inbreeding depression, which in turn may favor inbreeding tolerance and influence the evolution of mating systems and other inbreedingavoidance mechanisms.parental care | environmental stress | fitness | inbreeding depression | inbreeding tolerance

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Parental care buffers against inbreeding depression in burying beetles

Pilakouta

Jamieson

Moorad

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…Although recent studies show that inbreeding avoidance is a subject of debate with some animals showing no avoidance or even preference to mate with relatives (Kokko and Ots, 2006;Jamieson et al, 2009), the majority of studies show that inbreeding is usually avoided. In a recent review article, Szulkin et al (2013) point out that current theory is inefficient to understand inbreeding strategy. Hence, we can anticipate neither the difficulty to enforce half-sib mating nor the consequences associated with this breeding strategy for a given species.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The efficiency of close inbreeding to reduce genetic adaptation to captivity

Theodorou

Couvet

2014

Heredity

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Although ex situ conservation is indispensable for thousands of species, captive breeding is associated with negative genetic changes: loss of genetic variance and genetic adaptation to captivity that is deleterious in the wild. We used quantitative genetic individual-based simulations to model the effect of genetic management on the evolution of a quantitative trait and the associated fitness of wild-born individuals that are brought to captivity. We also examined the feasibility of the breeding strategies under a scenario of a large number of loci subject to deleterious mutations. We compared two breeding strategies: repeated half-sib mating and a method of minimizing mean coancestry (referred to as gc/mc). Our major finding was that halfsib mating is more effective in reducing genetic adaptation to captivity than the gc/mc method. Moreover, half-sib mating retains larger allelic and adaptive genetic variance. Relative to initial standing variation, the additive variance of the quantitative trait increased under half-sib mating during the sojourn in captivity. Although fragmentation into smaller populations improves the efficiency of the gc/mc method, half-sib mating still performs better in the scenarios tested. Half-sib mating shows two caveats that could mitigate its beneficial effects: low heterozygosity and high risk of extinction when populations are of low fecundity and size and one of the following conditions are met: (i) the strength of selection in captivity is comparable with that in the wild, (ii) deleterious mutations are numerous and only slightly deleterious. Experimental validation of half-sib mating is therefore needed for the advancement of captive breeding programs.

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“…Based on the assumption that mating between close relatives is costly due to inbreeding depression, the inbreeding avoidance hypothesis proposes that by means of natural selection, active or passive mechanisms to avoid breeding with close relatives will evolve (Szulkin et al 2013). According to Pusey and Wolf (1996), the presence of inbreeding depression is per se a strong enough force for evolution of inbreeding avoidance mechanisms.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mating patterns in an inbred Arctic carnivore

2018

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Mating patterns are highly context-dependent and the outcome of selection pressures formed by ecological factors, inbreeding levels and access to available partners. In small and inbred populations, matings are limited by high kin encounter rates and access to mates. In this paper, we use background pedigree data to investigate mating patterns and inbreeding avoidance in an isolated and critically endangered Arctic fox (Vulpes lagopus) population. Empirical data showed avoidance of matings within natal family. Based on 35 documented matings, we only recorded two full-sibling matings and these occurred between individuals from different natal families. Matings between second-order relatives, however, occurred to the same extent as between unrelated individuals. To test how this influenced the population development of inbreeding (f), we simulated scenarios of random mating, exclusion of natal family and exclusion of individuals in already existing pair bonds. The observed development of inbreeding did not correspond the expected scenario of random mating (linear regression, r 2 = 0.354, P = 0.20), but showed a comparable outcome as the simulated development of discriminating natal family (linear regression, r 2 = 0.980, P < 0.001). We conclude that behavioural, pre-copulatory inbreeding avoidance strategies occur in this population and that exclusion of mating with natal family causes a slower increase in inbreeding levels compared to random mating. This study demonstrates how long-term monitoring, pedigree construction and simulations can generate information valuable for an in-depth understanding of both conservation genetics and behavioural ecology in threatened populations.

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Inbreeding avoidance, tolerance, or preference in animals?

Cited by 182 publications

References 73 publications

Parental care buffers against inbreeding depression in burying beetles

Parental care buffers against inbreeding depression in burying beetles

The efficiency of close inbreeding to reduce genetic adaptation to captivity

Mating patterns in an inbred Arctic carnivore

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