Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39302970›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2024

The battle of the sexes in humans is highly polygenic.

Jared M Cole, Carly B Scott, Mackenzie M Johnson, Peter R Golightly, Jedidiah Carlson, Matthew J Ming, Arbel Harpak, Mark Kirkpatrick

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
8citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

8 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Reverse genetics of sexual antagonism.Nature ecology & evolution · 2026
    Article
  3. Drivers of systemic male-female allele frequency divergence in humans.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026
    Article
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Profile of Mark Kirkpatrick.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  7. Article
  8. The battle of the sexes in humans is highly polygenic.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

8 authors.

Jared M ColeDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.
Carly B ScottDepartment of Biology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599.ORCID 0000-0002-4451-6741
Mackenzie M JohnsonComputational Biology Program, Public Health Sciences Division, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, Seattle, WA 98109.
Peter R GolightlyDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.
Jedidiah CarlsonDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.ORCID 0000-0002-1363-872X
Matthew J MingDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.
Arbel HarpakDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.ORCID 0000-0002-3655-748X
Mark KirkpatrickDepartment of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712.ORCID 0000-0002-0039-4172

Funding

Genomic causes and consequences of sexually antagonistic selectionR01GM116853 · NIGMS · UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN · PI KIRKPATRICK, MARK · 2015 to 2022
$3.5M
Making Genomic Prediction of Complex Disease EquitableR35GM151108 · NIGMS · UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN · PI Arbel Harpak · 2023 to 2026
$1.6M
HHS | NIH | National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) GM116853HHS | NIH | National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) GM151108NIGMS NIH HHS R01 GM116853NIGMS NIH HHS R35 GM151108
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Sex-differential selection (SDS), which occurs when the fitness effects of alleles differ between males and females, can have profound impacts on the maintenance of genetic variation, disease risk, and other key aspects of natural populations. Because the sexes mix their autosomal genomes each generation, quantifying SDS is not possible using conventional population genetic approaches. Here, we introduce a method that exploits subtle sex differences in haplotype frequencies resulting from SDS acting in the current generation. Using data from 300K individuals in the UK Biobank, we estimate the strength of SDS throughout the genome. While only a handful of loci under SDS are individually significant, we uncover highly polygenic signals of genome-wide SDS for both viability and fecundity. Selection coefficients of [Formula: see text] may be typical. Despite its ubiquity, SDS may impose a mortality load of less than 1%. An interesting life-history tradeoff emerges: Alleles that increase viability more strongly in females than males tend to increase fecundity more strongly in males than in females. Finally, we find marginal evidence of SDS on fecundity acting on alleles affecting arm fat-free mass. Taken together, our findings connect the long-standing evidence of SDS acting on human phenotypes with its impact on the genome.

Indexed as

FertilityMultifactorial InheritanceAllelesFemaleGenome, HumanGenome-Wide Association StudyHaplotypesHumansMaleSelection, GeneticSex Characteristicsgenetic conflictgenomicssexually antagonistic selectionUK Biobank

Identifiers

PMID39302970
PMCPMC11441502

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY-NC-ND
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Registered trials

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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.