Indigenous Seeds, Seed Selection and Seed Bank for Sustainable Agriculture

Indigenous seeds are grown by the farmers over the years with a strong influence from local natural factors. Such seeds have a higher level of intrapopulation variations and the capacity of buffering the adverse factors. Understanding indigenous seeds along with their diversity are useful to diversify their uses, to assess conservation status, to know the factors making farming areas red zone, and to improve their performance. Selection is the simplest and most common method for the improvement of crop varieties. The variation must be created and maintained to impose selection. Different types of selection can be considered depending on the mode of reproduction of crops. Response to selection and correlated response are estimated to make the selection process more effective. Many different selection approaches can target either developing monomorphic or polymorphic varieties. There are five selection units and can be applied in five crop stages. Farmers’ criteria need to be considered during selection process. Based on the genotypic classes, there are three types of selection namely stabilizing selection, directional selection, and disruptive selection. The most simple and common selection methods are pure lines, mass selection, and class-bulking selection. Orthodox seeds in short, medium, and long-term storage facilities are conserved as a seed bank. Major types are household seed banks, community seed banks, national seeds, natural seed banks, and global seed banks. A seed bank is for assuring the availability of crop diversity for research, study, and production. The common works in seed banks are diversity collection, regeneration, characterization, multiplication, and distribution along with online database management.

Attracting pollinators vs escaping herbivores: eco-evolutionary dynamics of plants confronted with an ecological trade-off

A large number of plant traits are subject to an ecological trade-off between attracting pollinators and escaping herbivores. The interplay of both plant-animal interactions determines their evolution. Within a plant-pollinator-herbivore community in which interaction strengths depend on trait-matching, eco-evolutionary dynamics are studied using the framework of adaptive dynamics. We characterize the type of selection acting on the plant phenotype and the consequences for multispecies coexistence. We find that pollination favors stabilizing selection and coexistence. In contrast, herbivory fosters runaway selection, which threatens plant-animal coexistence. These contrasting dynamics highlight the key role of ecological trade-offs in structuring ecological communities. In particular, we show that disruptive selection is possible when such trade-offs are strong. While the interplay of pollination and herbivory is known to maintain plant polymorphism in several cases, our work suggests that it might also have fueled the diversification process itself.

Evolution of warfare by resource raiding favors polymorphism in belligerence and bravery

From protists to primates, intergroup aggression and warfare over resources has been observed in several taxa whose populations typically consist of groups connected by limited genetic mixing. Here, we model the co-evolution between four traits relevant to this setting: (i) investment into common-pool resource production within groups ('helping'); (ii) proclivity to raid other groups to appropriate their resources ('belligerence'); and investments into (iii) defense and (iv) offense of group contests ('defensive and offensive bravery'). We show that when traits co-evolve, the population often experiences disruptive selection favouring two morphs: 'Hawks', who express high levels of both belligerence and offensive bravery; and 'Doves', who express neither. This social polymorphism involves further among-traits associations when the fitness costs of helping and bravery interact. In particular if helping is antagonistic with both forms of bravery, co-evolution leads to the coexistence of individuals that either: (i) do not participate into common-pool resource production but only in its defense and appropriation ('Scrounger Hawks'); or (ii) only invest into common pool resource production ('Producer Doves'). Provided groups are not randomly mixed, these findings are robust to several modelling assumptions. This suggests that inter-group aggression is a potent mechanism in favoring within-group social diversity and behavioural syndromes.

Predicting selection-response gradients of heat tolerance in a wide-ranging reef-building coral

ABSTRACTOcean temperatures continue to rise due to climate change but it is unclear if heat tolerance of marine organisms will keep pace. Understanding how tolerance scales from individuals to species and quantifying adaptive potentials is essential to forecasting responses to warming. We reproductively crossed corals from a globally distributed species (Acropora tenuis) on the Great Barrier Reef (Australia) from three thermally distinct reefs to create 85 novel offspring lineages. Individuals were experimentally exposed to temperatures (27.5, 31, and 35.5 - 36 °C) in adult and two critical early life-history stages (larval development and settlement) to assess acquired heat tolerance via introgression on offspring phenotypes by comparing multiple physiological responses (photosynthetic yields, bleaching, necrosis, settlement, and survival). Adaptive potentials and physiological reaction norms were calculated across multiple life-stages to integrate heat tolerance at different biological scales. Selective breeding improved larval survival to heat by 1.5-2.5x but settlement success showed limited improvement. Adult responses to selection at heat were similar but were greater in larvae from warmer reefs compared to the cooler reef. There was also a divergence between adults and offspring mean population responses, likely underpinned by heat stress imposing strong divergent selection on adult colonies. These results have implications for downstream selection during reproduction, as evidenced by variability in a conserved heat tolerance response across offspring lineages. These results inform our ability to forecast the impacts of climate change on wild populations of corals and will aid in developing novel conservation tools like the assisted evolution of at-risk species.SUMMARY STATEMENTHeat stress exerts disruptive selection on adult corals. This likely underpins variability in offspring survival and results in differences in offspring responses to selection.

Context-dependent behavioural plasticity compromises disruptive selection of sperm traits in squid

Sperm morphology is generally uniform within a species due to selective pressures that act to achieve better fertilization outcomes under postcopulatory competitive circumstances. Therefore, polyandry that intensifies post-mating sperm competition should constrain intraspecific sperm polymorphism. Contrary to this paradigm, we previously found that a polyandrous squid, Heterololigo bleekeri, produces dimorphic eusperm (flagellum length dimorphism; FLD), which is closely associated with alternative reproductive tactics (ARTs); large males (consorts) transfer their spermatophores inside the female’s mantle cavity, while small males (sneakers) do so outside the mantle. Thus, FLD was considered as the consequence of different insemination strategies that arise from different modes of sperm competition, sperm storage and the fertilization environment. However, in other squid species showing ARTs, the choice of mating behaviour is rather conditional (i.e., switching mating tactic between consorts and sneakers), which poses the question of whether sperm FLD could have evolved. Here, we investigated five species in the family Loliginidae that exhibit ARTs and found that all species showed sneaker-biased FLD. However, in a species with conditional ARTs, we found FLD rather ambiguous and the testicular somatic index to be nearly continuous among individuals at transitional state, suggesting that plasticity in mating behaviour compromises the disruptive selection on a sperm morphological trait.

Adaptive ecological niche migration does not negate extinction susceptibility

Extinction rates in the modern world are currently at their highest in 66 million years and are likely to increase with projections of future climate change. Our knowledge of modern-day extinction risk is largely limited to decadal-centennial terrestrial records, while data from the marine realm is typically applied to high-order (> 1 million year) timescales. At present, it is unclear whether fossil organisms with common ancestry and ecological niche exhibit consistent indicators of ecological stress prior to extinction. The marine microfossil record, specifically that of the planktonic foraminifera, allows for high-resolution analyses of large numbers of fossil individuals with incredibly well-established ecological and phylogenetic history. Here, analysis of the isochronous extinction of two members of the planktonic foraminiferal genus Dentoglobigerina shows disruptive selection differentially compounded by permanent ecological niche migration, “pre-extinction gigantism”, and photosymbiont bleaching prior to extinction. Despite shared ecological and phylogenetic affinity, and timing of extinction, the marked discrepancies observed within the pre-extinction phenotypic responses are species-specific. These behaviours may provide insights into the nature of evolution and extinction in the open ocean and can potentially assist in the recognition and understanding of marine extinction risk in response to global climate change.

John Marion Thoday. 30 August 1916—25 August 2008

Professor John M. Thoday, ScD, FRS, was Arthur Balfour Professor of Genetics at the University of Cambridge from 1959 until 1983. In that position, he was influential in establishing genetics as an integral part of the undergraduate programme in biology at Cambridge, and he developed an active research programme that explored genetic processes underlying quantitative genetic traits, natural selection in sympatric populations and genetic variation in human and other populations. In more than 125 publications, he brought insightful attention to questions that had often been overlooked by others. Some of his most significant work explored the genetic basis of quantitative traits and thus pioneered approaches to understanding the mechanisms behind responses to selection. This helped set the stage to uncovering genes in the multiple-gene systems that determine polygenic characters in fields from medicine to agriculture. Other key work focused on disruptive, or diversifying, selection as a potential mechanism for populations to respond to adaptive challenges in nature. When his study of disruptive selection began, many in the field believed it was not even a possible process. In his many roles, John Thoday was a mentor who stimulated an open, respectful and intellectually rich academic environment for the Department of Genetics at Cambridge and for his field of creative activity.

Disruptive Selection of Human Immunostimulatory and Immunosuppressive Genes Both Provokes and Prevents Rheumatoid Arthritis, Respectively, as a Self-Domestication Syndrome

Using our previously published Web service SNP_TATA_Comparator, we conducted a genome-wide study of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within core promoters of 68 human rheumatoid arthritis (RA)-related genes. Using 603 SNPs within 25 genes clinically associated with RA-comorbid disorders, we predicted 84 and 70 candidate SNP markers for overexpression and underexpression of these genes, respectively, among which 58 and 96 candidate SNP markers, respectively, can relieve and worsen RA as if there is a neutral drift toward susceptibility to RA. Similarly, we predicted natural selection toward susceptibility to RA for 8 immunostimulatory genes (e.g., IL9R) and 10 genes most often associated with RA (e.g., NPY). On the contrary, using 25 immunosuppressive genes, we predicted 70 and 109 candidate SNP markers aggravating and relieving RA, respectively (e.g., IL1R2 and TGFB2), suggesting that natural selection can simultaneously additionally yield resistance to RA. We concluded that disruptive natural selection of human immunostimulatory and immunosuppressive genes is concurrently elevating and reducing the risk of RA, respectively. So, we hypothesize that RA in human could be a self-domestication syndrome referring to evolution patterns in domestic animals. We tested this hypothesis by means of public RNA-Seq data on 1740 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) of pets vs. wild animals (e.g., dogs vs. wolves). The number of DEGs in the domestic animals corresponding to worsened RA condition in humans was significantly larger than that in the related wild animals (10 vs. 3). Moreover, much less DEGs in the domestic animals were accordant to relieved RA condition in humans than those in the wild animals (1 vs. 8 genes). This indicates that the anthropogenic environment, in contrast to a natural one, affects gene expression across the whole genome (e.g., immunostimulatory and immunosuppressive genes) in a manner that likely contributes to RA. The difference in gene numbers is statistically significant as confirmed by binomial distribution (p < 0.01), Pearson’s χ2 (p < 0.01), and Fisher’s exact test (p < 0.05). This allows us to propose RA as a candidate symptom within a self-domestication syndrome. Such syndrome might be considered as a human’s payment with health for the benefits received during evolution.

Natural selection in the origin: how does selection act on snails’ shell colour in the source of a diversified population?

The mechanisms of adaptive radiation with phenotypic diversification and further adaptive speciation have been becoming clearer through a number of studies. Natural selection is one of the primary factors that contribute to these mechanisms. It has been demonstrated that divergent natural selection acts on a certain trait in adaptive radiation. However, it is not often known how natural selection acts on the source of a diversified population, although it has been detected in phylogenetic studies. Our study demonstrates how selection acts on a trait in a source population of diversified population using the Japanese land snail Euhadra peliomphala simodae. This snail’s shell colour has diversified due to disruptive selection after migration from the mainland to islands. We used trail-camera traps to identify the cause of natural selection on both the mainland and an island. We then conducted a mark-recapture experiment on the mainland to detect natural selection and compare the shape and strength of it to previous study in an island. In total, we captured and marked around 1,700 snails, and some of them were preyed on by an unknown predator. The trail-camera traps showed that the predator is the large Japanese field mouse Apodemus speciosus, but this predation did not correlate with shell colour. A Bayesian approach showed that the stabilising selection from factors other than predation acted on shell colour. Our results suggest that natural selection was changed by migration, which could explain the ultimate cause of phenotypic diversification in adaptive radiation that was not due to predation.

Rare morph Lake Malawi mbuna cichlids benefit from reduced aggression from con- and hetero-specifics

Balancing selection is important for the maintenance of polymorphism as it can prevent either fixation of one morph through directional selection or genetic drift, or speciation by disruptive selection. Polychromatism can be maintained if the fitness of alternative morphs depends on the relative frequency in a population. In aggressive species, negative frequency-dependent antagonism can prevent an increase in the frequency of rare morphs as they would only benefit from increased fitness while they are rare. Heterospecific aggression is common in nature and has the potential to contribute to rare morph advantage. Here we carry out field observations and laboratory aggression experiments with mbuna cichlids from Lake Malawi, to investigate the role of con- and heterospecific aggression in the maintenance of polychromatism and identify benefits to rare mores which are likely to result from reduced aggression. Within species we found that males and females bias aggression towards their own morph, adding to the evidence that inherent own-morph aggression biases can contribute to balancing selection. Over-representation of rare morph territory owners may be influenced by two factors; higher tolerance of different morph individuals as neighbours, and ability of rare morphs to spend more time feeding. Reduced aggression to rare morph individuals by heterospecifics may also contribute to rare morph advantage.