Genomic basis of life history evolution in Drosophila melanogaster

Natural diversity in aging and other life history patterns is a hallmark of organismal variation. Related species, populations, and individuals within populations show genetically based variation in life span and other aspects of age-related performance. Population differences are especially informative because these differences can be large relative to within-population variation and because they occur in organisms with otherwise similar genomes. We used experimental evolution to produce populations divergent for life span and late-age fertility and then used deep genome sequencing to detect sequence variants with nucleotide-level resolution. Several genes and genome regions showed strong signatures of selection, and the same regions were implicated in independent comparisons, suggesting that the same alleles were selected in replicate lines. Genes related to oogenesis, immunity, and protein degradation were implicated as important modifiers of late-life performance. Expression profili...衰老与其他生活史模式的自然多样性，是生物体变异的标志性特征。亲缘关系相近的物种、种群以及种群内个体，在寿命及其他衰老相关生理机能方面均存在遗传基础的变异。种群间的差异尤其具有研究价值——这类差异相较于种群内部变异往往更为显著，且其产生于基因组整体背景相似的生物体中。我们借助实验进化（experimental evolution）技术构建了寿命与晚年生育力存在显著分化的种群，随后采用深度基因组测序（deep genome sequencing）以核苷酸级分辨率检测序列变异。多个基因及基因组区域呈现出强烈的选择信号，且这些区域在独立比对中均被关联到，这表明在重复实验株系中受到选择的为同一组等位基因（allele）。与卵子发生、免疫及蛋白质降解相关的基因，被证实为晚年生理机能的重要调控修饰因子。表达谱分析……