A test of evolutionary theories of aging
AUTOR(ES)
Hughes, Kimberly A.
FONTE
National Academy of Sciences
RESUMO
Senescence is a nearly universal feature of multicellular organisms, and understanding why it occurs is a long-standing problem in biology. The two leading theories posit that aging is due to (i) pleiotropic genes with beneficial early-life effects but deleterious late-life effects (“antagonistic pleiotropy”) or (ii) mutations with purely deleterious late-life effects (“mutation accumulation”). Previous attempts to distinguish these theories have been inconclusive because of a lack of unambiguous, contrasting predictions. We conducted experiments with Drosophila based on recent population-genetic models that yield contrasting predictions. Genetic variation and inbreeding effects increased dramatically with age, as predicted by the mutation theory. This increase occurs because genes with deleterious effects with a late age of onset are unopposed by natural selection. Our findings provide the strongest support yet for the mutation theory.
ACESSO AO ARTIGO
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=137876Documentos Relacionados
- Cellular aging: theories and technological influence
- A Test Of The Formal And Modern Theories Of Matching
- ETOPE: evolutionary test of predicted exons
- Theories about evolutionary origins of human hepatitis B virus in primates and humans
- The Six-Pack as a Test for the New Intergovernmentalism and Supranationalism Theories
