Trends in Ecology & Evolution
OpinionWhat is a paternal effect?
Section snippets
An unexpected source of heritable variation
Paternal effects (the influence of fathers on the features of their offspring via mechanisms other than the transmission of alleles) have long been regarded as a rare phenomenon confined to species exhibiting paternal care. However, a rapidly growing body of evidence now shows that such effects occur in a variety of organisms, can be mediated by cellular and physiological processes that characterise all sexually reproducing eukaryotic species, and affect a broad range of phenotypic traits in
The nature of paternal effects
Parents contribute in many ways to the development of their offspring but, by conventional definition, a paternal (or maternal) effect can be said to occur when variation in the paternal (or maternal) genotype or phenotype is causally associated with variation in offspring phenotype, and this effect cannot be accounted for by offspring genotype [14]. It has been recognised for a long time that the causal link between parents and offspring –that forms the basis of all forms of heredity – is the
Paternal or maternal?
When paternal influences on offspring are mediated by maternal responses (Box 1), we run into an obvious conundrum: should these effects be regarded as paternal effects or maternal effects? The logic of analysis of variance (ANOVA) suggests the most straightforward decision rule. Statistically, an effect occurs when variation in an independent variable is associated with variation in the response (dependent variable). Note that, although a key assumption of such analysis is that the
Questions to guide research on paternal effects
We outline below some key questions that can serve as a guide to research on the physiology, behavioural ecology, and evolutionary biology of paternal effects.
Concluding remarks and future directions
Mounting evidence from studies on a variety of organisms indicates that paternal effects are widespread and important. Indeed, because the paternal germline appears to be highly susceptible to environment-induced epigenetic reprogramming 55, 56, 72, 73, paternal effects could turn out to be as commonplace as maternal effects. However, the fundamental asymmetry between maternal and paternal influences on offspring, and the mediating role of maternal responses in many paternal effects, complicate
Acknowledgements
Funding for this work was provided by the Australian Research Council through a Discovery Early Career Researcher Award to A.J.C. and a Future Fellowship to R.B.
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