西南地区乡土杨树遗传变异的SRAP分析

采用SRAP分子标记技术对西南地区11种乡土杨树共333份样本的遗传变异进行分析,7对引物组合共扩增出215条带,其中多态性条带158条,多态性条带百分率为73.49%,表明11种乡土杨树间存在广泛变异。AMOVA分析结果显示,种间遗传变异分量为10.84,占总变异的48.70%,遗传差异达极显著水平(P0.001)。种间的遗传相似系数变幅在0.8199~0.9607之间,平均遗传相似系数为0.8983。聚类结果表明,昌都杨和藏川杨之间的遗传差异最小,大叶杨和三脉青杨之间的遗传差异最大。本研究结果为西南地区乡土杨树基因资源的保护、开发和利用提供了一定的科学理论依据。     

金线兰及近缘种植物遗传多样性ISSR分子标记分析

利用ISSR分子标记技术对我国不同地区收集的金线兰及其近缘种种质资源进行亲缘关系及遗传多样性分析。结果显示:9条ISSR引物在50份材料中共扩增条带156条,其中多态性条带155条,多态性比率达99.36%;UPGMA树状图分析显示,样本总体相似系数介于0.56~0.90之间,在相似系数0.65处可分4大类群,其中金线兰主要集中于A大类群。A大类群又可分为3个亚类5个小亚类,亚类中不同地区来源的金线兰种质没有明显的界限。去除部分地区来源不明材料,46份材料依不同地理来源分成8个种群,其中福建野生金线兰4个种群,二者Nei's基因多样性指数(H)分别为0.322和0.295,处兰科植物中等水平;种群遗传分化系数(Gst)分别为0.328和0.240,处兰科植物较低水平。AMOVA分析显示样本种群内变异指数87%,种群间变异指数13%,表明种群间可能存在基因交流。     

刺葡萄种内遗传多样性研究进展

刺萄萄主要分布在我国长江中下游及以南地区,是中国野生萄萄中果粒最大的一个种,其果实高抗炭疽病和白腐病,在湖南、江西、福建、贵州等省的部分地区一直作为鲜食和酿酒品种栽培利用。刺葡萄种内遗传多样性较为丰富,为了充分挖掘利用刺葡萄资源,提高刺葡萄资源的利用效率,本文从刺葡萄的物候学、花器类型、形态性状、果实理化性状、花粉形态、DNA遗传水平和抗性等方面进行种内多样性的研究和综述,以期为刺葡萄种质资源的保护、鉴定评价和发掘利用奠定基础。     

不同地域野生欧李及其近缘植物亲缘关系的RAPD分析

利用RAPD分子标记技术对21个不同地域欧李及其近缘种属植物(桃、杏、李、樱桃)进行了遗传亲缘关系及分类研究。结果表明,用于不同地域野生欧李分析的25条引物中,共扩增出441个清晰可用的DNA片段,其中多态性位点366个,多态性比为82.99%。在遗传相似系数为0.71时,可将中国野生欧李资源划分为3个大的区域,分别为东北分布群、华北华东分布群与中西部分布群。用于欧李及其近缘种属植物分析的20条引物中,共扩出多态性带683条,多态性比率为98.99%。聚类分析表明,在遗传相似系数为0.61时,欧李与其近缘种属植物分为3大类;欧李与麦李的亲缘关系最近,与桃亲缘关系最远。     

SCoT分子标记在植物研究中的应用进展

SCo T是一种新型的目的基因分子标记,该标记不仅能获得与性状联系紧密的目的基因,而且能对性状进行跟踪,已被广泛应用于多种植物的研究。本文概述了SCo T标记的原理、引物设计方法及特点,并从PCR反应体系建立与优化、种质资源遗传多样性与亲缘关系分析、种质鉴定与指纹图谱构建、基因差异表达与分子遗传连锁图谱构建等方面总结了SCo T标记的应用进展。同时,对其存在的问题进行了讨论,并展望了该标记的发展应用前景。     

Differential responses to artificial selection on oviposition site preferences in Drosophila melanogaster and D. simulans

The preference–performance relationship in plant–insect interactions is a central theme in evolutionary ecology. Among many insects, eggs are vulnerable and larvae have limited mobility, making the choice of an appropriate oviposition site one of the most important decisions for a female. We investigated the evolution of oviposition preferences in Drosophila melanogaster Meigen and Drosophila simulans Sturtevant by artificially selecting for the preference for 2 natural resources, grape and quince. The main finding of our study is the differential responses of D. melanogaster and D. simulans. Although preferences evolved in the experimental populations of D. melanogaster, responses were not consistent with the selection regimes applied. In contrast, responses in D. simulans were consistent with expectations, demonstrating that this species has selectable genetic variation for the trait. Furthermore, crosses between D. simulans divergent lines showed that the genetic factors involved in grape preference appear to be largely recessive. In summary, our artificial selection study suggests that D. melanogaster and D. simulans possess different genetic architectures for this trait.     

Etiological overlap between obsessive‐compulsive disorder and anorexia nervosa: a longitudinal cohort,multigenerational family and twin study

Obsessive‐compulsive disorder (OCD) often co‐occurs with anorexia nervosa (AN), a comorbid profile that complicates the clinical management of both conditions. This population‐based study aimed to examine patterns of comorbidity, longitudinal risks, shared familial risks and shared genetic factors between OCD and AN at the population level. Participants were individuals with a diagnosis of OCD (N=19,814) or AN (N=8,462) in the Swedish National Patient Register between January 1992 and December 2009; their first‐, second‐ and third‐degree relatives; and population‐matched (1:10 ratio) unaffected comparison individuals and their relatives. Female twins from the population‐based Swedish Twin Register (N=8,550) were also included. Females with OCD had a 16‐fold increased risk of having a comorbid diagnosis of AN, whereas males with OCD had a 37‐fold increased risk. Longitudinal analyses showed that individuals first diagnosed with OCD had an increased risk for a later diagnosis of AN (risk ratio, RR=3.6), whereas individuals first diagnosed with AN had an even greater risk for a later diagnosis of OCD (RR=9.6). These longitudinal risks were about twice as high for males than for females. First‐ and second‐degree relatives of probands with OCD had an increased risk for AN, and the magnitude of this risk tended to increase with the degree of genetic relatedness. Bivariate twin models revealed a moderate but significant degree of genetic overlap between self‐reported OCD and AN diagnoses (r_a=0.52, 95% CI: 0.26‐0.81), but most of the genetic variance was disorder‐specific. The moderately high genetic correlation supports the idea that this frequently observed comorbid pattern is at least in part due to shared genetic factors, though disorder‐specific factors are more important. These results have implications for current gene‐searching efforts and for clinical practice.     

Genes are information,so information theory is coming to the aid of evolutionary biology

Speciation is central to evolutionary biology, and to elucidate it, we need to catch the early genetic changes that set nascent taxa on their path to species status (Via 2009 ). That challenge is difficult, of course, for two chief reasons: (i) serendipity is required to catch speciation in the act; and (ii) after a short time span with lingering gene flow, differentiation may be low and/or embodied only in rare alleles that are difficult to sample. In this issue of Molecular Ecology Resources, Smouse et al. ( 2015 ) have noted that optimal assessment of differentiation within and between nascent species should be robust to these challenges, and they identified a measure based on Shannon's information theory that has many advantages for this and numerous other tasks. The Shannon measure exhibits complete additivity of information at different levels of subdivision. Of all the family of diversity measures (‘0’ or allele counts, ‘1’ or Shannon, ‘2’ or heterozygosity, F_ST and related metrics) Shannon's measure comes closest to weighting alleles by their frequencies. For the Shannon measure, rare alleles that represent early signals of nascent speciation are neither down‐weighted to the point of irrelevance, as for level 2 measures, nor up‐weighted to overpowering importance, as for level 0 measures (Chao et al. 2010 , 2015 ). Shannon measures have a long history in population genetics, dating back to Shannon's PhD thesis in 1940 (Crow 2001 ), but have received only sporadic attention, until a resurgence of interest in the last ten years, as reviewed briefly by Smouse et al. ( 2015 ).