Early release of eggs and embryos in a brooding ancient asexual ostracod: brood selection or a gambling strategy to increase fecundity? |
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Authors: | Ricardo L Pinto Carlos E F Rocha Koen Martens |
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Institution: | 1.Departamento de Zoologia, Instituto de Biociências,Universidade de S?o Paulo,S?o Paulo,Brazil;2.Freshwater Biology,Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences,Brussels,Belgium;3.Deparment of Biology,University of Ghent,Ghent,Belgium |
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Abstract: | Asexual lineages lack the means to purge their genomes of (deleterious) mutations through recombination. Evolutionary theory
thus predicts that such lineages will be prone to early extinction. In brooding animals, brood selection might provide a mechanism
to counter the accumulation of mutations. Of the three putative ancient asexual animal groups, only the darwinulid ostracods
are brooders. Here, we test the incidence of egg and juvenile abortion in a darwinulid species, Penthesilenula brasiliensis, under two temperature treatments. Part of the offspring is released without brooding (close to 30% in one treatment). The
majority of these aborted eggs hatches and develops. As it is unlikely that females are such bad judges of offspring quality,
either the surviving animals will present deficiencies later on in development (brood selection) or early egg release can
be a (bet-hedging) strategy to increase fecundity in favourable conditions. |
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Keywords: | Brooding Ancient asexual Ostracoda Darwinulidae Reproduction Evolution Bet-hedging |
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