Journal
PLOS ONE
Volume 2, Issue 9, Pages -Publisher
PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0000892
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- National Science Foundation [DEB 99-74369, DEB 04-22386, DEB 05-29679, DEB 06-19012]
- University of Connecticut Research Foundation
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Mitochondrial inheritance is generally assumed to be maternal. However, there is increasing evidence of exceptions to this rule, especially in hybrid crosses. In these cases, mitochondria are also inherited paternally, so paternal leakage'' of mitochondria occurs. It is important to understand these exceptions better, since they potentially complicate or invalidate studies that make use of mitochondrial markers. We surveyed F-1 offspring of experimental hybrid crosses of the 17-year periodical cicadas Magicicada septendecim, M. septendecula, and M. cassini for the presence of paternal mitochondrial markers at various times during development (1-day eggs; 3-,6-, 9-week eggs; 16-month old 1(st) and 2(nd) instar nymphs). We found evidence of paternal leakage in both reciprocal hybrid crosses in all of these samples. The relative difficulty of detecting paternal mtDNA in the youngest eggs and ease of detecting leakage in older eggs and in nymphs suggests that paternal mitochondria proliferate as the eggs develop. Our data support recent theoretical predictions that paternal leakage may be more common than previously estimated.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available