ArticleEvolution letters2021
Does genetic diversity protect host populations from parasites? A meta-analysis across natural and agricultural systems.
Article in Evolution letters, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed.
- From Food Systems to Gut Microbiota: Dietary Substrates, Microbial Exposure and One Health.Microorganisms · 2026Review
- Conventional Wisdom Revised in Terms of a Diversity-Uncertainty Model for the Effect of Host Genetic Diversity on Mean Epidemic Size and Its Variability.Ecology and evolution · 2026Review
- Review
- How Population Structure and Nest Membership Shape Pathogen Patterns in Bumble Bees.Molecular ecology · 2025Article
- A Conceptual Disease Cycle Model to Link the Size of Past and Future Epidemics.Ecology and evolution · 2025Review
- Host-related genetic differentiation of a polyxenic avian ectoparasite,International journal for parasitology. Parasites and wildlife · 2025Article
- A Simplified and Integrated View of Disease Control in Varietal Mixtures Using the Phytobiome Framework.Plant, cell & environment · 2025Review
- Dare to be resilient: the key to future pesticide-free orchards?Journal of experimental botany · 2024Review
- Neonicotinoid exposure increases Varroa destructor (Mesostigmata: Varroidae) mite parasitism severity in honey bee colonies and is not mitigated by increased colony genetic diversity.Journal of insect science (Online) · 2024Article
- Increase of niche filling with increase of host richness for plant-infecting mastreviruses.Virus evolution · 2024Article
- Haitian coffee agroforestry systems harbor complex arabica variety mixtures and under-recognized genetic diversity.PloS one · 2024Article
- Loss of species and genetic diversity during colonization: Insights from acanthocephalan parasites in northern European seals.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- Host genetic identity determines parasite community structure across time and space in oyster restoration.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Mechanistic models to meet the challenge of climate change in plant-pathogen systems.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Review
- Genomic Underpinnings of Population Persistence in Isle Royale Moose.Molecular biology and evolution · 2023Article
- High Temporal Variability in Late Blight Pathogen Diversity, Virulence, and Fungicide Resistance in Potato Breeding Fields: Results from a Long-Term Monitoring Study.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Infectious disease in an era of global change.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2022Review
- Challenging a host-pathogen paradigm: Susceptibility to chytridiomycosis is decoupled from genetic erosion.Journal of evolutionary biology · 2022Article
- Genetic diversity and disease: The past, present, and future of an old idea.Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · 2022Article
- Causation without correlation: parasite-mediated frequency-dependent selection and infection prevalence.Biology letters · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
If parasites transmit more readily between closely related hosts, then parasite burdens should decrease with increased genetic diversity of host populations. This important hypothesis is often accepted at face value-notorious epidemics of crop monocultures testify to the vulnerability of host populations that have been purged of diversity. Yet the relationship between genetic diversity and parasitism likely varies across contexts, differing between crop and noncrop hosts and between experimental and natural host populations. Here, we used a meta-analytic approach to ask if host diversity confers protection against parasites over the range of contexts in which it has been tested. We synthesized the results of 102 studies, comprising 2004 effect sizes representing a diversity of approaches and host-parasite systems. Our results validate a protective effect of genetic diversity, while revealing significant variation in its strength across biological and empirical contexts. In experimental host populations, genetic diversity reduces parasitism by ∼20% for noncrop hosts and by ∼50% for crop hosts. In contrast, observational studies of natural host populations show no consistent relationship between genetic diversity and parasitism, with both strong negative and positive correlations reported. This result supports the idea that, if parasites preferentially attack close relatives, the correlation of genetic diversity with parasitism could be positive or negative depending upon the potential for host populations to evolve in response to parasite selection. Taken together, these results reinforce genetic diversity as a priority for both conservation and agriculture and emphasize the challenges inherent to drawing comparisons between controlled experimental populations and dynamic natural populations.
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