A test of the snowball theory for the rate of evolution of hybrid incompatibilities
Abstract
Rolling Snowballs The genetic incompatibilities that separate ongoing speciation events have been hypothesized by the Dobzhansky-Muller model of speciation to snowball—that is, accumulate mutations causing postzygotic isolation at a faster rate than the linear accumulation of mutations. This occurs because of potential deleterious epistatic interactions in hybrids involving two or more interacting genes. Testing QTLs (quantitative trait loci) in seed and pollen sterility between multiple species pairs in the plant group Solanum , Moyle and Nakazato (p. 1521 ) show that hybrid female (seed) sterility accumulates exponentially between increasingly distant species pairs, although not for hybrid male (pollen) sterility. In contrast, loci contributing to differences in other traits show no evidence for nonlinear accumulation over time. Matute et al. (p. 1518 ) come to similar conclusions through the use of deletion mapping in comparisons between two pairs of species of Drosophila . The number of genes causing postzygotic isolation grows as fast as the square of the number of substitutions between two species. Thus, a hybrid snowball effect is found in both plants and animals.
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The faster-than-linear accumulation of hybrid incompatibilities with divergence time has been recovered in multiple taxa including Solanum, Drosophila, and Mus musculus.
“this result has been recovered in multiple taxa: Including Solanum (Moyle and Nakazato 2010; Guerrero et al. 2017), Drosophila (Matute et al. 2010), or Mus musculus (Wang et al. 2015).”
From Finding Hybrid Incompatibilities Using Genome Sequences from Hybrid Populations (2021) · cites this paper as Matute et al. 2010
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Shedding light on the grey zone of speciation along a continuum of genomic divergence
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Finding Hybrid Incompatibilities Using Genome Sequences from Hybrid Populations
Blanckaert, A., & Payseur, B. A. (2021) · Molecular Biology and Evolution · doi:10.1093/molbev/msab168 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
“…of hybrid incompatibilities is expected to grow faster than linearly with divergence time (Orr, 1995) and this result has been recovered in multiple taxa: including Solanum (Moyle and Nakazato, 2010; Guerrero et al., 2017), Drosophila (Matute et al., 2010) or Mus musculus (Wang et al., 2015).”
BackgroundInfluential
- Authors
- Matute, D. R., Butler, I. A., Turissini, D. A., & Coyne, J. A.
- Affiliations
- University of Chicago (US)
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2010-09-17
- Volume
- 329
- Issue
- 5998
- Pages
- 1518-1521
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W1973299341
- Cited by
- 216
- References
- 18
- Citations by year
- 2026: 7 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 20 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 14 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 16 · 2015: 20 · 2014: 16 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 12
- FWCI
- 7.73
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of General Medical Sciences (R01GM058260)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Evolution and Genetic Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Chromosomal and Genetic Variations
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Paleontology › Evolution and Paleontology Studies
- Keywords
- snowball effect, speciation, postzygotic isolation, hybrid incompatibility, epistasis, seed sterility, pollen sterility, quantitative trait loci, deletion mapping, Solanum, Drosophila, evolutionary rates
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Crosses, Genetic, Drosophila, Drosophila melanogaster, Epistasis, Genetic, Biological Evolution, Female, Hybridization, Genetic, Infertility, Male, Models, Genetic, Reproduction, Species Specificity, Genes, Insect, Genetic Speciation
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