Weir, W. et al. (2016) Population genomics reveals the origin and asexual evolution of human infective trypanosomes. eLife, 5, e11473. (doi: 10.7554/eLife.11473) (PMID:26809473) (PMCID:PMC4739771)
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Abstract
Evolutionary theory predicts that the lack of recombination and chromosomal re-assortment in strictly asexual organisms results in homologous chromosomes irreversibly accumulating mutations and thus evolving independently of each other, a phenomenon termed the Meselson effect. We apply a population genomics approach to examine this effect in an important human pathogen, Trypanosoma brucei gambiense. We determine that T.b. gambiense is evolving strictly asexually and is derived from a single progenitor, which emerged within the last 10,000 years. We demonstrate the Meselson effect for the first time at the genome-wide level in any organism and show large regions of loss of heterozygosity, which we hypothesise to be a short-term compensatory mechanism for counteracting deleterious mutations. Our study sheds new light on the genomic and evolutionary consequences of strict asexuality, which this pathogen uses as it exploits a new biological niche, the human population.
| Item Type: | Articles |
|---|---|
| Status: | Published |
| Refereed: | Yes |
| Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: | Cooper, Dr Anneli and Pountain, Andrew and MacLeod, Professor Annette and Veitch, Dr Nicola and O'Connell, Dr Caroline and Capewell, Dr Paul and Weir, Professor Willie |
| Authors: | Weir, W., Capewell, P., Foth, B., Clucas, C., Pountain, A., Steketee, P., Veitch, N., Koffi, M., De Meeûs, T., Kaboré, J., Camara, M., Cooper, A., Tait, A., Jamonneau, V., Bucheton, B., Berriman, M., and MacLeod, A. |
| College/School: | College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Life Sciences College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Infection & Immunity College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Biodiversity, One Health & Veterinary Medicine |
| Journal Name: | eLife |
| Publisher: | eLife Sciences Publications |
| ISSN: | 2050-084X |
| ISSN (Online): | 2050-084X |
| Copyright Holders: | Copyright © 2016 Weir et al. |
| First Published: | First published in eLife 5:e11473 |
| Publisher Policy: | Reproduced under a Creative Commons License |
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