Trade‐offs in defence to pathogen species revealed in expanding nematode populations

Ordovás-Montañés, María; Preston, Gail; Hoang, Kim Le Mai; Rafaluk‐Mohr, Charlotte; King, Kayla C.

doi:10.1111/jeb.14023

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

References 48 publications

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“…Investment in life-history traits that improve reproduction and offspring survival is associated with a reduction in defense efficiency in C. elegans . This result was consistent with numerous studies demonstrating negative relationship between reproduction and immunity efficiency in birds [ 63 ], insects [ 17 ], gastropods [ 25 ] or the nematode C. elegans [ 64 , 65 ]. Furthermore, studies have demonstrated in C. elegans and D. melanogaster that the absence of reproduction linked to the lack of a germline increases resistance to various pathogens [ 66 , 67 ].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Host defense alteration in Caenorhabditis elegans after evolution under ionizing radiation

Quevarec,

Morran,

Dufourcq-Sekatcheff

et al. 2024

BMC Ecol Evo

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Background Adaptation to a stressor can lead to costs on other traits. These costs play an unavoidable role on fitness and influence the evolutionary trajectory of a population. Host defense seems highly subject to these costs, possibly because its maintenance is energetically costly but essential to the survival. When assessing the ecological risk related to pollution, it is therefore relevant to consider these costs to evaluate the evolutionary consequences of stressors on populations. However, to the best of our knowledge, the effects of evolution in irradiate environment on host defense have never been studied. Using an experimental evolution approach, we analyzed fitness across 20 transfers (about 20 generations) in Caenorhabditis elegans populations exposed to 0, 1.4, and 50.0 mGy.h− 1 of 137Cs gamma radiation. Then, populations from transfer 17 were placed in the same environmental conditions without irradiation (i.e., common garden) for about 10 generations before being exposed to the bacterial parasite Serratia marcescens and their survival was estimated to study host defense. Finally, we studied the presence of an evolutionary trade-off between fitness of irradiated populations and host defense. Results We found a lower fitness in both irradiated treatments compared to the control ones, but fitness increased over time in the 50.0 mGy.h− 1, suggesting a local adaptation of the populations. Then, the survival rate of C. elegans to S. marcescens was lower for common garden populations that had previously evolved under both irradiation treatments, indicating that evolution in gamma-irradiated environment had a cost on host defense of C. elegans. Furthermore, we showed a trade-off between standardized fitness at the end of the multigenerational experiment and survival of C. elegans to S. marcescens in the control treatment, but a positive correlation between the two traits for the two irradiated treatments. These results indicate that among irradiated populations, those most sensitive to ionizing radiation are also the most susceptible to the pathogen. On the other hand, other irradiated populations appear to have evolved cross-resistance to both stress factors. Conclusions Our study shows that adaptation to an environmental stressor can be associated with an evolutionary cost when a new stressor appears, even several generations after the end of the first stressor. Among irradiated populations, we observed an evolution of resistance to ionizing radiation, which also appeared to provide an advantage against the pathogen. On the other hand, some of the irradiated populations seemed to accumulate sensitivities to stressors. This work provides a new argument to show the importance of considering evolutionary changes in ecotoxicology and for ecological risk assessment.

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