Departmento de Xenética, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain.
Genetics. 2012 Sep;192(1):161-72. doi: 10.1534/genetics.112.142687. Epub 2012 Jun 19.
We present a transcriptomic analysis aimed at investigating whether the changes in gene expression that occur under inbreeding generally reduce or enhance inbreeding depression. Discerning between these two alternatives can be addressed only when both changes in expression due to inbreeding and to inbreeding depression are estimated simultaneously. We used Affymetrix 2.0 arrays to study the changes in gene expression associated with both inbreeding and inbreeding depression for fitness in four sets of inbred sublines of Drosophila melanogaster. We found that for most genes showing changes in expression associated with inbreeding, the least depressed sublines were those showing the largest departures in expression from that of the outbred control. This suggests a pattern consistent with a protective role of expression changes against inbreeding effects, and would reveal a new dimension of the transcriptomics of inbreeding. The variation in depression observed could then be due not only to the genetic damages primarily originating that depression, but also possibly to differences in the ability to carry out the appropriate adjustments in gene expression to cope with the inbreeding. We also found that these expression changes with a putative protective role against inbreeding effects show a clear specificity on RNA synthesis and splicing and energy derivation functions.
我们进行了一项转录组分析，旨在研究在近亲繁殖下发生的基因表达变化是否普遍减轻或加剧了近交衰退。只有当同时估计到由于近亲繁殖和近交衰退引起的表达变化时，才能区分这两种情况。我们使用 Affymetrix 2.0 芯片，研究了与适应度相关的基因表达变化，这些变化与四个品系的黑腹果蝇的近亲繁殖和近交衰退有关。我们发现，对于大多数与近亲繁殖相关的表达变化的基因来说，最不受衰退影响的亚系是那些与非近亲繁殖对照组的表达差异最大的亚系。这表明了一种与表达变化对近交效应具有保护作用的模式，这将揭示近交转录组学的一个新维度。观察到的衰退的变化可能不仅归因于主要引起衰退的遗传损伤，也可能归因于在进行适当的基因表达调整以应对近亲繁殖方面的能力差异。我们还发现，这些表达变化具有一种针对近交效应的潜在保护作用，在 RNA 合成和剪接以及能量衍生功能上表现出明显的特异性。
