Genetics of intersexual selection: conflict and coevolution

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Adaptive evolutionary change is based on selection acting on heritable traits and knowledge about the strength of selection and the heritability allows predicting the response to selection. Sexual selection is a particularly potent force that can result in the evolution of extravagated ornaments and is therefore a driving force for generating biological diversity. I will study the genetics of intersexual coevolution in the grasshopper Gomphocerus sibiricus. I will estimate the genetic and environmental components of phenotypic variance in preferences and ornaments and the genetic correlations between them. Furthermore, I will quantify the strength and environmental fluctuation in the strength of sexual selection. Another aspect of intersexual coevolution is sexual conflict over resource allocation. This is particularly pronounced in a promiscuous mating system. I will address antagonistic coevolution using the tools of quantitative genetics that allow describing the conflict as a system of interacting phenotypes, in which the genes of one individual influence the phenotypes of other individuals. Finally, I will elucidate the molecular genetic basis of sexually selected traits using genome-wide genotyping of molecular markers. This will enable the identification of functional genetic variants underlying the quantitative traits under selection.