Chronic stress response in vertebrates: The genetics of constraint and conflict

脊椎动物的慢性应激反应：约束和冲突的遗传学

• 批准号: BB/L022656/1
• 负责人: Alastair Wilson
• 金额: $ 58.24万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF EXETER
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2014 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=BB%2FL022656%2F1
• 关键词: Chronic; stress; response; vertebrates; genetics

IIn biology, stress is often a poorly defined concept, and one that is negatively associated with health in humans and animals. However, stress responses actually play an important positive role in maintaining viability and health. When challenged by a threat in the environment - perhaps a predator, disturbance, or adverse conditions - a set of neuroendocrine pathways trigger physiological and behavioural responses (e.g. fight or flight behaviours) that have evolved under natural selection to counter the threat. Nonetheless, while these acute stress responses are thought to be adaptive, it is also well documented that chronic stress exposure can reduce the health of individuals and sometimes - particularly when mothers are exposed - their offspring. Because chronic stress responses, also called "tertiary stress responses" (TSR) are typically bad for fitness (survival and/or reproduction), natural selection should act over evolutionary time to get rid of them. The fact that the TSR is widespread, being found in vertebrates ranging from fish to humans, therefore poses an important question- what constrains evolution of the stress response towards a state where these harmful, or maladaptive, effects do not occur? The goal of the proposed work is to answer this question by conducting a genetic study. We will use guppies as a model system, experimentally manipulating stressors in the environment, determining how different individuals and genotypes respond through behavioural and hormonal processes, and determining the long term consequences of this variation for fitness. In particular we will test two hypotheses about where the evolutionary constraint comes from that maintains the TSR. The first possibility is a trade-off between the effects of acute and chronic stress on fitness. In simple terms, genes that cause the TSR may persist in a population precisely because they are the ones that lead to the most appropriate acute stress responses. A second possibility is that, where mothers experience chronic stress, a trade-off occurs across the generations. Here, some maternal genotypes are better able than others to maintain the mother's own health, but do so at a cost to offspring (e.g. by reducing the amount of care she provides). Testing these hypotheses will shed light on the evolutionary processes that have shaped vertebrate stress responses in general. However, it is also expected that a better understanding of the genetics of chronic stress could yield tangible benefits for improving animal welfare in captive animal. For instance, if we understand how genes influencing aspects of the acute stress response contribute to the risk of developing disease under chronic stress, we might be able to select these traits so as to reduce health problems in livestock and aquaculture production in future.

在生物学中，压力通常是一个定义不明确的概念，并且与人类和动物的健康呈负相关。然而，压力反应实际上在维持生存能力和健康方面发挥着重要的积极作用。当受到环境中的威胁时-可能是捕食者，干扰或不利条件-一组神经内分泌途径触发生理和行为反应（例如战斗或逃跑行为），这些反应在自然选择下进化以对抗威胁。尽管如此，虽然这些急性压力反应被认为是适应性的，但也有充分的证据表明，长期压力暴露会降低个体的健康，有时-特别是当母亲暴露时-他们的后代。由于慢性应激反应，也被称为“三级应激反应”（TSR）通常不利于健康（生存和/或繁殖），自然选择应该在进化过程中消除它们。TSR广泛存在于从鱼类到人类的脊椎动物中，这一事实提出了一个重要的问题-是什么限制了压力反应的进化，使其达到不发生这些有害或适应不良影响的状态？拟议工作的目标是通过进行遗传研究来回答这个问题。我们将使用孔雀鱼作为模型系统，实验性地操纵环境中的压力源，确定不同的个体和基因型如何通过行为和激素过程做出反应，并确定这种变化对健身的长期影响。特别是，我们将测试两个假设的进化约束来自哪里，保持TSR。第一种可能性是在急性和慢性压力对健康的影响之间进行权衡。简而言之，导致TSR的基因可能会在人群中持续存在，因为它们是导致最适当的急性应激反应的基因。第二种可能性是，如果母亲经历长期压力，那么几代人之间就会出现权衡。在这里，一些母体基因型比其他基因型更能保持母亲自身的健康，但这样做是以牺牲后代为代价的（例如，通过减少她提供的护理量）。测试这些假设将揭示的进化过程，塑造了脊椎动物的压力反应一般。然而，人们也期望更好地了解慢性应激的遗传学可以为改善圈养动物的福利带来实实在在的好处。例如，如果我们了解影响急性应激反应的基因如何导致慢性应激下发生疾病的风险，我们可能能够选择这些特征，以减少未来畜牧业和水产养殖生产中的健康问题。

项目成果

Avoiding the misuse of BLUP in behavioural ecology.

• DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arx023
• 发表时间: 2017-07
• 期刊: Behavioral ecology : official journal of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology
• 作者: Houslay TM;Wilson AJ
• 通讯作者: Wilson AJ

Habituation and individual variation in the endocrine stress response in the Trinidadian guppy ( Poecilia reticulata )

特立尼达孔雀鱼（Poecilia reticulata）内分泌应激反应的习惯和个体差异

• DOI: 10.1101/337006
• 发表时间: 2018
• 作者: Houslay T

Who dares does not always win: risk-averse rockpool prawns are better at controlling a limited food resource

谁敢并不总是获胜：规避风险的岩池虾更擅长控制有限的食物资源

• DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2018.04.023
• 发表时间: 2018
• 期刊: Animal Behaviour
• 影响因子: 2.5
• 作者: Maskrey D

Desperate Prawns: Drivers of Behavioural Innovation Vary across Social Contexts in Rock Pool Crustaceans.

• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0139050
• 发表时间: 2015
• 期刊: PloS one
• 影响因子: 3.7
• 作者: Duffield C;Wilson AJ;Thornton A
• 通讯作者: Thornton A

How integrated are behavioral and endocrine stress response traits? A repeated measures approach to testing the stress-coping style model.

• DOI: 10.1002/ece3.1395
• 发表时间: 2015-02
• 期刊: ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTION
• 影响因子: 2.6
• 作者: Boulton, Kay;Couto, Elsa;Grimmer, Andrew J.;Earley, Ryan L.;Canario, Adelino V. M.;Wilson, Alastair J.;Walling, Craig A.
• 通讯作者: Walling, Craig A.