ArticleDevelopmental cell2022
Transgenerational inheritance of sexual attractiveness via small RNAs enhances evolvability in C. elegans.
Article in Developmental cell, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers.
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20 citing papers in PubMed, 40 citations in OpenAlex.
- Transgenerational inheritance of altered H3K27me3 in wild-type Caenorhabditis elegans.The EMBO journal · 2026Article
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- Impact of Fluorophore and Epitope Position on Destabilized Reporter Performance inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A genetic framework for RNAi inheritance in Caenorhabditis elegans.EMBO reports · 2025Article
- Alterations of mRNAs and Non-coding RNAs Associated with Neuroinflammation in Alzheimer's Disease.Molecular neurobiology · 2024Review
- Article
- C. elegans males optimize mate-preference decisions via sex-specific responses to multimodal sensory cues.Current biology : CB · 2024Article
- A natural bacterial pathogen of C. elegans uses a small RNA to induce transgenerational inheritance of learned avoidance.PLoS genetics · 2024Article
- Predator-induced transgenerational plasticity of parental care behaviour in male three-spined stickleback fish across two generations.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Tissue-specific silencing of integrated transgenes achieved through endogenous RNA interference inRNA biology · 2024Article
- Evolution beyond DNA: epigenetic drivers for evolutionary change?BMC biology · 2023Article
- Inheritance of Stress Responses via Small Non-Coding RNAs in Invertebrates and Mammals.Epigenomes · 2023Review
- A natural bacterial pathogen ofbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023Article
- Increased paternal corticosterone exposure influences offspring behaviour and expression of urinary pheromones.BMC biology · 2023Article
- Inter and transgenerational impact of H3K4 methylation in neuronal homeostasis.Life science alliance · 2023Article
- Inheritance of associative memories and acquired cellular changes in C. elegans.Nature communications · 2023Article
- The third barrier to transgenerational inheritance in animals: somatic epigenetic resetting.EMBO reports · 2023Article
- Article
- Modern physiology vindicates Darwin's dream.Experimental physiology · 2022Review
- Phenotypic plasticity as a facilitator of microbial evolution.Environmental epigenetics · 2022Review
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13 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
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Abstract
It is unknown whether transient transgenerational epigenetic responses to environmental challenges affect the process of evolution, which typically unfolds over many generations. Here, we show that in C. elegans, inherited small RNAs control genetic variation by regulating the crucial decision of whether to self-fertilize or outcross. We found that under stressful temperatures, younger hermaphrodites secrete a male-attracting pheromone. Attractiveness transmits transgenerationally to unstressed progeny via heritable small RNAs and the Argonaute Heritable RNAi Deficient-1 (HRDE-1). We identified an endogenous small interfering RNA pathway, enriched in endo-siRNAs that target sperm genes, that transgenerationally regulates sexual attraction, male prevalence, and outcrossing rates. Multigenerational mating competition experiments and mathematical simulations revealed that over generations, animals that inherit attractiveness mate more and their alleles spread in the population. We propose that the sperm serves as a "stress-sensor" that, via small RNA inheritance, promotes outcrossing in challenging environments when increasing genetic variation is advantageous.
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