ArticlePLoS genetics2015
Selection against heteroplasmy explains the evolution of uniparental inheritance of mitochondria.
Article in PLoS genetics, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 papers.
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Who cites it
22 citing papers in PubMed.
- Optimal Organelle Inheritance Strategies Under Different Changing Environments and Mutational Pressures.Genome biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Cell size and selection for stress-induced cell fusion in unicellular eukaryotes.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- Evolution and maintenance of mtDNA gene content across eukaryotes.The Biochemical journal · 2024Review
- Environmental and Genetic Traffic in the Journey from Sperm to Offspring.Biomolecules · 2023Review
- Inheritance through the cytoplasm.Heredity · 2022Review
- Organelle bottlenecks facilitate evolvability by traversing heteroplasmic fitness valleys.Frontiers in genetics · 2022Article
- A Naturally Heteroplasmic Clam Provides Clues about the Effects of Genetic Bottleneck on Paternal mtDNA.Genome biology and evolution · 2021Article
- Intimate Relations-Mitochondria and Ageing.International journal of molecular sciences · 2020Review
- Mitochondrial Inheritance in Phytopathogenic Fungi-Everything Is Known, or Is It?International journal of molecular sciences · 2020Review
- Evolution of asymmetric gamete signaling and suppressed recombination at the mating type locus.eLife · 2019Article
- Selfish genetic elements.PLoS genetics · 2018Review
- mitoTev-TALE: a monomeric DNA editing enzyme to reduce mutant mitochondrial DNA levels.EMBO molecular medicine · 2018Article
- Deletion of the sex-determining geneMobile DNA · 2018Article
- Evolution and inheritance of animal mitochondrial DNA: rules and exceptions.Journal of biological research (Thessalonike, Greece) · 2017Review
- Article
- Sexual conflict explains the extraordinary diversity of mechanisms regulating mitochondrial inheritance.BMC biology · 2017Article
- Uniparental Inheritance Promotes Adaptive Evolution in Cytoplasmic Genomes.Molecular biology and evolution · 2017Article
- Current strategies towards therapeutic manipulation of mtDNA heteroplasmy.Frontiers in bioscience (Landmark edition) · 2017Review
- What can we infer about the origin of sex in early eukaryotes?Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2016Review
- Frequent, geographically structured heteroplasmy in the mitochondria of a flowering plant, ribwort plantain (Plantago lanceolata).Heredity · 2016Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Why are mitochondria almost always inherited from one parent during sexual reproduction? Current explanations for this evolutionary mystery include conflict avoidance between the nuclear and mitochondrial genomes, clearing of deleterious mutations, and optimization of mitochondrial-nuclear coadaptation. Mathematical models, however, fail to show that uniparental inheritance can replace biparental inheritance under any existing hypothesis. Recent empirical evidence indicates that mixing two different but normal mitochondrial haplotypes within a cell (heteroplasmy) can cause cell and organism dysfunction. Using a mathematical model, we test if selection against heteroplasmy can lead to the evolution of uniparental inheritance. When we assume selection against heteroplasmy and mutations are neither advantageous nor deleterious (neutral mutations), uniparental inheritance replaces biparental inheritance for all tested parameter values. When heteroplasmy involves mutations that are advantageous or deleterious (non-neutral mutations), uniparental inheritance can still replace biparental inheritance. We show that uniparental inheritance can evolve with or without pre-existing mating types. Finally, we show that selection against heteroplasmy can explain why some organisms deviate from strict uniparental inheritance. Thus, we suggest that selection against heteroplasmy explains the evolution of uniparental inheritance.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.