Early-life environment and the potential for cascading maternal effects: an experimental approach.

当母亲的表型影响她的后代的表型时，母体效应就会发生，而不是她所贡献的基因的影响。它们可能会对后代的生活史产生很大影响，并可能导致影响进化速度的世代连锁效应。这项拟议的研究将利用圈养日本鹌鹑(Coturnix Japan Onica)独特的复制品系，无论母体对卵子大小的投资是高是低，都会被选中，以更深入地了解母体效应的进化动态。特别是，将调查环境在形成母体影响的潜力中所起的作用，以引起多代人的影响。通过将多世代受控育种设计与饲养环境的实验操作相结合，该研究将回答关于母体效应的遗传、环境在这种遗传中所起的作用、母体效应的级联或多代遗传的可能性以及它们对母亲及其后代特定年龄的生存和生殖表现的影响的问题。

Maternal effects occur when the phenotype of a mother affects the phenotype of her offspring beyond the effect of the genes she contributes. They can have a large impact on offspring life histories and may lead to cascading effects across generations that influence the speed of evolution. The proposed research will make use of unique replicate lines of captive Japanese quail (Coturnix japonica) selected for either high or low maternal investment in egg size, to gain more insight into the evolutionary dynamics of maternal effects. In particular, the role of the environment in shaping the potential of maternal effects to cause a multi-generational cascade of effects will be investigated. By combining a multi-generational controlled breeding design with experimental manipulation of the rearing environment, the research will answer questions regarding on the inheritance of maternal effects, the role the environment plays in this inheritance, the potential for cascading, or multi-generational, inheritance of maternal effects, and their consequences for age-specific survival and reproductive performance of mothers and their offspring.