RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 A demogenetic individual based model for the evolution of traits and genome architecture under sexual selection
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2020.04.01.014514
DO 10.1101/2020.04.01.014514
A1 Louise Chevalier
A1 François De Coligny
A1 Jacques Labonne
YR 2020
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/11/16/2020.04.01.014514.abstract
AB Sexual selection has long been known to favor the evolution of mating behaviors such as mate preference and competitiveness, and to affect their genetic architecture, for instance by favoring genetic correlation between some traits. Reciprocally, genetic architecture can affect the expression and the evolvability of traits and mating behaviors. But sexual selection is highly context-dependent, making interactions between individuals a central process in evolution, governing the transmission of genotypes to the next generation. This loop between the genetic structure conditioning the expression and evolution of traits and behaviour, and the feedback of this phenotypic evolution on the architecture of the genome in the dynamic context of sexual selection, has yet to be thoroughly investigated. We argue that demogenetic agent-based models (DG-ABM) are especially suited to tackle such a challenge because they allow explicit modelling of both the genetic architecture of traits and the behavioural interactions in a dynamic population context. We here present a DG-ABM able to simultaneously track individual variation in traits (such as gametic investment, preference, competitiveness), fitness and genetic architecture throughout evolution. Using two simulation experiments, we compare various mating systems and show that behavioral interactions during mating triggered some complex feedback in our model, between fitness, population demography, and genetic architecture, placing interactions between individuals at the core of evolution through sexual selection. DG-ABMs can, therefore, relate to theoretical patterns expected at the population level from simpler analytical models in evolutionary biology, and at the same time provide a more comprehensive framework regarding individual trait and behaviour variation, that is usually envisioned separately from genome architecture in behavioural ecology.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.