Marasco Valeria, Boner Winnie, Griffiths Kate, Raveh Shirley, Monaghan Pat
Department of Interdisciplinary Life Sciences, Research Institute of Wildlife Ecology, University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, Vienna, Austria.
School of Biodiversity, One Health and Veterinary Medicine, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK.
Ecol Lett. 2025 Jan;28(1):e70043. doi: 10.1111/ele.70043.
Offspring of older breeders frequently show reduced longevity, which has been linked to shorter offspring telomere length. It is currently unknown whether such telomere reduction persists beyond a single generation, as would be the case if germline transmission is involved. In a within-grandmother, multi-generational study using zebra finches, we show that the shorter telomeres observed in F1 offspring of older mothers are still present in the F2 generation even when the breeding age of their F1 mothers is young. The effect was substantial: 43% shorter telomeres in grandoffspring from the 'grandmother old at breeding' line compared with those from the 'grandmother young at breeding' line. Shorter telomeres at fledging in this species are associated with a reduction in lifespan. Our data demonstrate the need to look beyond a single generation to explain inter-individual variation in ageing rates and thereby variation in optimal allocation of age-specific reproductive effort.
老龄繁殖者的后代往往寿命较短，这与后代端粒长度较短有关。目前尚不清楚这种端粒缩短是否会在一代以上持续存在，如果涉及种系传递，情况就会如此。在一项使用斑胸草雀的祖母内多代研究中，我们发现，即使其F1代母亲的繁殖年龄较小，老龄母亲的F1代后代中观察到的较短端粒在F2代中仍然存在。这种影响是显著的：与“繁殖时年轻的祖母”品系的孙代相比，“繁殖时年老的祖母”品系的孙代端粒短43%。在这个物种中，幼雏期端粒较短与寿命缩短有关。我们的数据表明，需要超越单一代来解释个体衰老率的差异，从而解释特定年龄繁殖努力的最佳分配差异。
