Publication Date:
2015-07-03
Description:
Sex determination in animals is amazingly plastic. Vertebrates display contrasting strategies ranging from complete genetic control of sex (genotypic sex determination) to environmentally determined sex (for example, temperature-dependent sex determination). Phylogenetic analyses suggest frequent evolutionary transitions between genotypic and temperature-dependent sex determination in environmentally sensitive lineages, including reptiles. These transitions are thought to involve a genotypic system becoming sensitive to temperature, with sex determined by gene-environment interactions. Most mechanistic models of transitions invoke a role for sex reversal. Sex reversal has not yet been demonstrated in nature for any amniote, although it occurs in fish and rarely in amphibians. Here we make the first report of reptile sex reversal in the wild, in the Australian bearded dragon (Pogona vitticeps), and use sex-reversed animals to experimentally induce a rapid transition from genotypic to temperature-dependent sex determination. Controlled mating of normal males to sex-reversed females produces viable and fertile offspring whose phenotypic sex is determined solely by temperature (temperature-dependent sex determination). The W sex chromosome is eliminated from this lineage in the first generation. The instantaneous creation of a lineage of ZZ temperature-sensitive animals reveals a novel, climate-induced pathway for the rapid transition between genetic and temperature-dependent sex determination, and adds to concern about adaptation to rapid global climate change.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Holleley, Clare E -- O'Meally, Denis -- Sarre, Stephen D -- Marshall Graves, Jennifer A -- Ezaz, Tariq -- Matsubara, Kazumi -- Azad, Bhumika -- Zhang, Xiuwen -- Georges, Arthur -- England -- Nature. 2015 Jul 2;523(7558):79-82. doi: 10.1038/nature14574.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Institute for Applied Ecology, University of Canberra, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia. ; 1] Institute for Applied Ecology, University of Canberra, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia [2] School of Life Science, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria 3086, Australia.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26135451" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
*Adaptation, Physiological
;
Animals
;
Australia
;
Female
;
Male
;
Molecular Sequence Data
;
Reptiles
;
Sex Chromosomes/genetics
;
Sex Determination Processes/genetics/*physiology
;
Sex Ratio
;
*Temperature
Print ISSN:
0028-0836
Electronic ISSN:
1476-4687
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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