Journal
JOURNAL OF EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY
Volume 17, Issue 6, Pages 1167-1177Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/j.1420-9101.2004.00808.x
Keywords
chimera; clonality; intraclonal variation; modular organisms; mosaic; unitary organisms
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
An increasing number of studies have recently detected within-organism genetic heterogeneity suggesting that genetically homogeneous organisms may be rare. In this review, we examine the potential costs and benefits of such intraorganismal genetic heterogeneity (IGH) on the fitness of the individual. The costs of IGH include cancerous growth, parasitism, competitive interactions and developmental instability, all of which threaten the integrity of the individual while the potential benefits are increased genetic variability, size-specific processes, and synergistic interactions between genetic variants. The particular cost or benefit of IGH in a specific case depends on the organism type and the origin of the IGH. While mosaicism easily arise by genetic changes in an individual, and will be the more common type of IGH, chimerism originates by the fusion of genetically distinct entities, and is expected to be substantially rare in most organisms. Potential conflicts and synergistic effects between different genetic lineages within an individual provide an interesting example for theoretical and empirical studies of multilevel selection.
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