Gardner Andy, Kalinka Alex T
Institute of Evolutionary Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3JT, UK.
J Theor Biol. 2006 Aug 21;241(4):707-15. doi: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2006.01.011. Epub 2006 Feb 20.
Mutational robustness is the degree to which a phenotype, such as fitness, is resistant to mutational perturbations. Since most of these perturbations will tend to reduce fitness, robustness provides an immediate benefit for the mutated individual. However, robust systems decay due to the accumulation of deleterious mutations that would otherwise have been cleared by selection. This decay has received very little theoretical attention. At equilibrium, a population or asexual lineage is expected to have a mutation load that is invariant with respect to the selection coefficient of deleterious alleles, so the benefit of robustness (at the level of the population or asexual lineage) is temporary. However, previous work has shown that robustness can be favoured when robustness loci segregate independently of the mutating loci they act upon. We examine a simple two-locus model that allows for intermediate rates of recombination and inbreeding to show that increasing the effective recombination rate allows for the evolution of greater mutational robustness.
突变稳健性是指一种表型（如适合度）对突变扰动的耐受程度。由于这些扰动大多会降低适合度，稳健性为发生突变的个体带来直接益处。然而，稳健系统会因有害突变的积累而衰退，否则这些有害突变会被选择清除。这种衰退很少受到理论关注。在平衡状态下，一个种群或无性系谱系预计具有一个与有害等位基因的选择系数无关的突变负荷，因此稳健性的益处（在种群或无性系谱系水平上）是暂时的。然而，先前的研究表明，当稳健性位点与它们所作用的突变位点独立分离时，稳健性会受到青睐。我们研究了一个简单的双位点模型，该模型允许中等水平的重组率和近亲繁殖率，以表明提高有效重组率能够促进更高水平的突变稳健性的进化。
