Selfing and resource allocation in Schiedea salicaria (Caryophyllaceae), a gynodioecious species

Abstract Levels of selfing and resource allocation patterns were investigated in Schiedea salicaria (Caryophyllaceae), a gynodioecious species with high levels of inbreeding depression and nuclear control of male sterility. Selfing levels were higher in hermaphrodites than females, especially when adjusted for early acting inbreeding depression. The sexes of S. salicaria were similar in most allocation patterns including number of flowers and capsules per inflorescence, seeds per flower, and seed mass. Seeds produced by females had higher levels of germination than seeds of hermaphrodites, a likely result of high selfing levels and the expression of inbreeding depression in the progeny of hermaphrodites. Invasion of females in populations of S. salicaria is probably related to the expression of inbreeding depression at germination and in later life history stages. Comparisons with related species of Schiedea that also have nuclear control of male sterility suggest that reallocation of resources in hermaphrodites to male function occurs as females increase in frequency, but that resource reallocation is not important for the success of females when they first invade populations.     

Cortical spreading depression modifies components of the inflammatory cascade

As more information becomes available regarding the role of inflammation following stroke, it is apparent that some inflammatory mediators are detrimental and others are beneficial to the progression of ischemic injury. Cortical spreading depression (CSD) is known to impart some degree of ischemic tolerance to the brain and to influence the expression of many genes. Many of the genes whose expression is altered by CSD are associated with inflammation, and it appears likely that modulation of the inflammatory response to ischemia by CSD contributes to ischemic tolerance. Understanding which inflammatory processes are influenced by CSD may lead to the identification of novel targets in the effort to develop an acute treatment for stroke.     

Self-fertilization and the escape from pollen limitation in variable pollination environments

Seed production in many plants is pollen limited, likely because of unpredictable variation in the pollinator environment. One way for plants to escape the consequences of pollinator variability is to evolve mating systems, such as autonomous selfing, that assure reproduction without relying on pollinators. We explore this hypothesis through the construction and analysis of heuristic models of plant population dynamics in seed- or site-limited populations. Our analysis suggests several important points: the familiar rule that inbreeding depression greater than 0.5 maintains outcrossing significantly underestimates the threshold required under pollen limited conditions with prior selfing; variability in the pollination environment erodes the ability of inbreeding depression to maintain outcrossing; and variable pollination environments can result in stable intermediate rates of prior selfing. The results reflect the importance of geometric mean fitness (which in a variable environment is less than the arithmetic mean) in the face of temporal variation.     

DOES LINKAGE DISEQUILIBRIUM GENERATE HETEROZYGOSITY‐FITNESS CORRELATIONS IN GREAT REED WARBLERS?

Heterozygosity-fitness correlations (HFCs) at noncoding genetic markers are commonly assumed to reflect fitness effects of heterozygosity at genomewide distributed genes in partially inbred populations. However, in populations with much linkage disequilibrium (LD), HFCs may arise also as a consequence of selection on fitness loci in the local chromosomal vicinity of the markers. Recent data suggest that relatively high levels of LD may prevail in many ecological situations. Consequently, LD may be an important factor, together with partial inbreeding, in causing HFCs in natural populations. In the present study, we evaluate whether LD can generate HFCs in a small and newly founded population of great reed warblers (Acrocephalus arundinaceus). For this purpose dyads of full siblings of which only one individual survived to adult age (i.e., returned to breed at the study area) were scored at 19 microsatellite loci, and at a gene region of hypothesized importance for survival, the major histocompatibility complex (MHC). By examining siblings, we controlled for variation in the inbreeding coefficient and thus excluded genome-wide fitness effects in our analyses. We found that recruited individuals had significantly higher multilocus heterozygosity (MLH), and mean d2 (a microsatellite-specific variable), than their nonrecruited siblings. There was a tendency for the survivors to have a more diverse MHC than the nonsurvivors. Single-locus analyses showed that the strength of the genotype-survival association was especially pronounced at four microsatellite loci. By using genotype data from the entire breeding population, we detected significant LD between five of 162 pairs of microsatellite loci after accounting for multiple tests. Our present finding of a significant within-family multilocus heterozygosity-survival association in a nonequilibrium population supports the view that LD generates HFCs in natural populations.     

On the evolutionary costs of self-incompatibility: incomplete reproductive compensation due to pollen limitation

Pollen limitation affects plants with diverse reproductive systems and ecologies. In self-incompatible (SI) species, pollen limitation may preclude full reproductive compensation for prezygotic rejection of pollen. We present a model designed to explore the effects of incomplete reproductive compensation on evolutionary changes at a modifier locus that regulates the level of SI expression. Our results indicate that incomplete reproductive compensation greatly increases the evolutionary costs of SI, particularly in populations with low S-allele diversity. The evolutionary fate of modifiers of SI expression depends on the rate at which they are transmitted to future generations as well as the effects of SI on offspring number and quality. Partial SI expression can represent a stable condition rather than an evolutionarily transient state between full expression and full suppression. This unanticipated result provides the first theoretical support for the evolutionary stability of such mixed mating systems, the existence of which has recently been documented.     

Contrasting genetic structure of adults and progeny in a Louisiana iris hybrid population

Studies of natural hybridization have suggested that it may be a creative stimulus for adaptive evolution and speciation. An important step in this process is the establishment of fit recombinant genotypes that are buffered from subsequent recombination with unlike genotypes. We used molecular markers and a two-generation sampling strategy to infer the extent of recombination in a Louisiana iris hybrid zone consisting predominantly of Iris fulva-type floral phenotypes. Genotypic diversity was fairly high, indicating that sexual reproduction is frequent relative to clonal reproduction. However, we observed strong spatial genetic structure even after controlling for clonality, which implies a low level of pollen and seed dispersal. We therefore used cluster analysis to explore the hypothesis that the fulva-type hybrids are an admixture of groups between which there has been limited recombination. Our results indicate that several such groups are present in the population and are strongly localized spatially. This spatial pattern is not attributable strictly to a lack of mating opportunities between dissimilar genotypes for two reasons: (1) relatedness of flowering pairs was uncorrelated with the degree of overlap in flowering, and (2) paternity analysis shows that pollen movement among the outcross fraction occurred over large distances, with roughly half of all paternity attributed to pollen flow from outside the population. We also found evidence of strong inbreeding depression, indicated by contrasting estimates of the rate of self-fertilization and the average inbreeding coefficient of fulva-type hybrids. We conclude that groups of similar hybrid genotypes can be buffered from recombination at small spatial scales relative to pollen flow, and selection against certain recombinant genotypes may be as important as or more important than clonal reproduction and inbreeding.     

An investigation into signal transduction mechanisms involved in insulin-induced long-term depression in the CA1 region of the hippocampus

Recent work has demonstrated that brief application of insulin to hippocampal slices can induce a novel form of long-term depression (insulin-LTD) in the CA1 region of the hippocampus; however, the molecular details of how insulin triggers LTD remain unclear. Using electrophysiological and biochemical approaches in the hippocampal slices, we show here that insulin-LTD (i) is specific to 3-hydroxy-5-methylisoxazole-4-propionic acid (AMPA) receptor- but not NMDA receptor-mediated synaptic transmission; (ii) is induced and expressed postsynaptically but does not require the activation of ionotropic and metabotropic glutamate receptors; (iii) requires a concomitant Ca(2+) influx through l-type voltage-activated Ca(2+) channels (VACCs) and the release of Ca(2+) from intracellular stores; (iv) requires the series of protein kinases, including protein tyrosine kinase (PTK), phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K), and protein kinase C (PKC); (v) is mechanistically distinct from low-frequency stimulation-induced LTD (LFS-LTD) and independent on protein phosphatase 1/2 A (PP1/2 A) and PP2B activation; (vi) is dependent on a rapamycin-sensitive local translation of dendritic mRNA, and (vii) is associated with a persistent decrease in the surface expression of GluR2 subunit. These results suggest that a PI3K/PKC-dependent insulin signaling, which controls postsynaptic surface AMPA receptor numbers through PP-independent endocytosis, may be a major expression mechanism of insulin-LTD in hippocampal CA1 neurons.     

Does inbreeding avoidance maintain gender dimorphism in Wurmbea dioica (Colchicaceae)?

The maintenance of females in gender dimorphic populations requires that they have a fitness advantage to compensate for their loss of male reproductive function. We assess whether inbreeding avoidance provides this advantage in two subdioecious Wurmbea dioica populations by estimating seed production, outcrossing rates and inbreeding depression. Fruiting males produced less than half as many seeds as females, owing to low outcrossing rates and early acting inbreeding depression. Inbreeding coefficients of fruiting males demonstrated that progeny were more inbred than their parents, implying that few selfed progeny reach maturity, as confirmed by inbreeding depression estimates that exceeded 0.85. In a glasshouse experiment, open-pollinated females exhibited a fitness advantage of 3.7 relative to fruiting males, but when we increased fruiting male outcrossing rate, female advantage was only 1.4. This reduced advantage is insufficient to maintain females if nuclear genes control sex. Thus, inbreeding avoidance could maintain females at high frequencies, although this is contingent upon high frequencies of fruiting males, which can be altered by environmentally determined gender plasticity.     

Reduced inbreeding depression due to historical inbreeding in Drosophila melanogaster: evidence for purging

An important issue in conservation biology and the study of evolution is the extent to which inbreeding depression can be reduced or reversed by natural selection. If the deleterious recessive alleles causing inbreeding depression can be 'purged' by natural selection, outbred populations that have a history of inbreeding are expected to be less susceptible to inbreeding depression. This expectation, however, has not been realized in previous laboratory experiments. In the present study, we used Drosophila melanogaster as a model system to test for an association between inbreeding history and inbreeding depression. We created six 'purged' populations from experimental lineages that had been maintained at a population size of 10 male-female pairs for 19 generations. We then measured the inbreeding depression that resulted from one generation of full-sib mating in the purged populations and in the original base population. The magnitude of inbreeding depression in the purged populations was approximately one-third of that observed in the original base population. In contrast to previous laboratory experiments, therefore, we found that inbreeding depression was reduced in populations that have a history of inbreeding. The large purging effects observed in this study may be attributable to the rate of historical inbreeding examined, which was slower than that considered in previous experiments.     

Prevalence of obese patients in a primary care setting

Objective: Previous research has addressed the relationship between BMI and chronic disease in primary care; however, little has been done with regard to the association between obesity and depression in primary care. The purpose of this paper is to assess the relationship between obesity and chronic conditions including depression. Research Methods and Procedures : Data from primary care patients seen at a university‐based family medicine clinic in the southeastern United States were extracted for the time between January 1, 1999 and January 1, 2002. Data extracted included most recent height and weight, age, ethnicity, pregnancy status, number of office visits, blood pressure, cholesterol, hemoglobin A_1C, current diagnoses, and medications. Results : A total of 8197 patients were included in the analysis. Sixty‐nine percent of patients seen in a 3‐year period were either overweight or obese. Comparing blood pressure, cholesterol, diagnoses, and medications between BMI groups found differences in virtually all categories. Diagnoses of high cholesterol, hypertension, diabetes, and depression significantly increased for obese patients. Discussion : Obese patients are over‐represented in primary care, and this over‐representation of obesity correlates with several diagnoses, including depression. Depression is a chronic disease that may interfere with health‐related behaviors and must be addressed within the health care system.