ArticlePloS one2012
Selfish little circles: transmission bias and evolution of large deletion-bearing mitochondrial DNA in Caenorhabditis briggsae nematodes.
Article in PloS one, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 41 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
41 citing papers in PubMed, 66 citations in OpenAlex.
- Inheritance and selection of the mitochondrial genome.Nature reviews. Genetics · 2026Review
- Positive and relaxed selection on mitochondrial DNA in parasitic versus predatory mites.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2026Article
- Spectrum and Impact of Mitochondrial DNA Mutations in Ovarian Cancer.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Review
- Effects of mating system and adaptedness on the evolution of fitness and mtDNA copy number in mitonuclear mismatched C. elegans.Heredity · 2025Article
- Inheritance bias of deletion-harbouring mtDNA in yeast: The role of copy number and intracellular selection.PLoS genetics · 2025Article
- Dissecting the sequential evolution of a selfish mitochondrial genome in Caenorhabditis elegans.Heredity · 2024Article
- Evolution and maintenance of mtDNA gene content across eukaryotes.The Biochemical journal · 2024Review
- Mitochondrial genome fragmentation is correlated with increased rates of molecular evolution.PLoS genetics · 2024Article
- Friend turned foe: selfish behavior of a spontaneously arising mitochondrial deletion in an experimentally evolved Caenorhabditis elegans population.G3 (Bethesda, Md.) · 2024Article
- Evolutionary codependency: insights into the mitonuclear interaction landscape from experimental and wild Caenorhabditis nematodes.Current opinion in genetics & development · 2023Review
- Independent evolution of highly variable, fragmented mitogenomes of parasitic lice.Communications biology · 2022Article
- Inheritance through the cytoplasm.Heredity · 2022Review
- Cellular mechanisms of mtDNA heteroplasmy dynamics.Critical reviews in biochemistry and molecular biology · 2021Review
- Natural and Artificial Mechanisms of Mitochondrial Genome Elimination.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Review
- Disrupted architecture and fast evolution of the mitochondrial genome of Argeia pugettensis (Isopoda): implications for speciation and fitness.BMC genomics · 2020Article
- The conflict within: origin, proliferation and persistence of a spontaneously arising selfish mitochondrial genome.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2020Article
- Article
- A Genome-wide Screen Reveals that Reducing Mitochondrial DNA Polymerase Can Promote Elimination of Deleterious Mitochondrial Mutations.Current biology : CB · 2019Article
- Evolving mtDNA populations within cells.Biochemical Society transactions · 2019Review
- Complex Transmission Patterns and Age-Related Dynamics of a Selfish mtDNA Deletion.Integrative and comparative biology · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Selfish DNA poses a significant challenge to genome stability and organismal fitness in diverse eukaryotic lineages. Although selfish mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) has known associations with cytoplasmic male sterility in numerous gynodioecious plant species and is manifested as petite mutants in experimental yeast lab populations, examples of selfish mtDNA in animals are less common. We analyzed the inheritance and evolution of mitochondrial DNA bearing large heteroplasmic deletions including nad5 gene sequences (nad5Δ mtDNA), in the nematode Caenorhabditis briggsae. The deletion is widespread in C. briggsae natural populations and is associated with deleterious organismal effects. We studied the inheritance patterns of nad5Δ mtDNA using eight sets of C. briggsae mutation-accumulation (MA) lines, each initiated from a different natural strain progenitor and bottlenecked as single hermaphrodites across generations. We observed a consistent and strong drive toward higher levels of deletion-bearing molecules in the heteroplasmic pool of mtDNA after ten generations of bottlenecking. Our results demonstrate a uniform transmission bias whereby nad5Δ mtDNA accumulates to higher levels relative to intact mtDNA in multiple genetically diverse natural strains of C. briggsae. We calculated an average 1% per-generation transmission bias for deletion-bearing mtDNA relative to intact genomes. Our study, coupled with known deleterious phenotypes associated with high deletion levels, shows that nad5Δ mtDNA are selfish genetic elements that have evolved in natural populations of C. briggsae, offering a powerful new system to study selfish mtDNA dynamics in metazoans.
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