Mating behavior in allopatric and sympatric postzygotically isolated populations of the model Saccharomyces paradoxus

奇异酵母模型异域和同域合子后隔离种群的交配行为

• 批准号: 0820969
• 负责人: Clifford Zeyl
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Wake Forest University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2008-09-01 至 2011-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0820969&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Mating; behavior; allopatric; sympatric; postzygotically

Understanding the process of speciation is a major goal of evolutionary research; currently, most of our knowledge comes from plant and animal studies. Microbial species make up most of the world's biodiversity, but because many are hard to isolate and culture, little is known about how they interact. This research will investigate interactions among natural populations of the sexual yeast Saccharomyces paradoxus that may be undergoing speciation. Individual cells will be tested for preferences among potential mates from the same and other populations - a new approach in microbial ecology - to determine the mechanism underlying reproductive isolation between populations. The variants of genes responsible for a yeast cell's ability to identify and communicate with an appropriate mating partner will then be identified and studied.This research may provide the first example in a microbial species of the evolution of differences that allow ecologically similar and closely related populations to co-exist. Furthermore, understanding cell-to-cell communication between microbial populations and species has implications for the spread of genetic material across species boundaries in important contexts such as the passage of virulence genes between pathogenic and non-pathogenic fungal species. Studying these basic processes in a risk-free system offers a valuable opportunity to understand them.

了解物种形成的过程是进化研究的一个主要目标;目前，我们的大部分知识来自植物和动物研究。微生物物种构成了世界上生物多样性的大部分，但由于许多微生物很难分离和培养，因此对它们如何相互作用知之甚少。这项研究将调查自然种群之间的相互作用的性酵母矛盾，可能正在经历物种形成。单个细胞将被测试来自相同和其他种群的潜在配偶之间的偏好-微生物生态学的一种新方法-以确定种群之间生殖隔离的机制。酵母细胞负责识别和与合适的交配伙伴交流的基因变体将被识别和研究。这项研究可能提供微生物物种差异进化的第一个例子，允许生态相似和密切相关的种群共存。此外，了解微生物种群和物种之间的细胞间通讯对遗传物质在重要背景下跨越物种边界的传播具有影响，例如致病性和非致病性真菌物种之间的毒力基因的传递。在无风险系统中研究这些基本过程提供了一个了解它们的宝贵机会。