@article{1172, abstract = {A central issue in cell biology is the physico-chemical basis of organelle biogenesis in intracellular trafficking pathways, its most impressive manifestation being the biogenesis of Golgi cisternae. At a basic level, such morphologically and chemically distinct compartments should arise from an interplay between the molecular transport and chemical maturation. Here, we formulate analytically tractable, minimalist models, that incorporate this interplay between transport and chemical progression in physical space, and explore the conditions for de novo biogenesis of distinct cisternae. We propose new quantitative measures that can discriminate between the various models of transport in a qualitative manner-this includes measures of the dynamics in steady state and the dynamical response to perturbations of the kind amenable to live-cell imaging.}, author = {Sachdeva, Himani and Barma, Mustansir and Rao, Madan}, journal = {Scientific Reports}, publisher = {Nature Publishing Group}, title = {{Nonequilibrium description of de novo biogenesis and transport through Golgi-like cisternae}}, doi = {10.1038/srep38840}, volume = {6}, year = {2016}, } @article{1195, abstract = {The genetic analysis of experimentally evolving populations typically relies on short reads from pooled individuals (Pool-Seq). While this method provides reliable allele frequency estimates, the underlying haplotype structure remains poorly characterized. With small population sizes and adaptive variants that start from low frequencies, the interpretation of selection signatures in most Evolve and Resequencing studies remains challenging. To facilitate the characterization of selection targets, we propose a new approach that reconstructs selected haplotypes from replicated time series, using Pool-Seq data. We identify selected haplotypes through the correlated frequencies of alleles carried by them. Computer simulations indicate that selected haplotype-blocks of several Mb can be reconstructed with high confidence and low error rates, even when allele frequencies change only by 20% across three replicates. Applying this method to real data from D. melanogaster populations adapting to a hot environment, we identify a selected haplotype-block of 6.93 Mb. We confirm the presence of this haplotype-block in evolved populations by experimental haplotyping, demonstrating the power and accuracy of our haplotype reconstruction from Pool-Seq data. We propose that the combination of allele frequency estimates with haplotype information will provide the key to understanding the dynamics of adaptive alleles. }, author = {Franssen, Susan and Barton, Nicholas H and Schlötterer, Christian}, journal = {Molecular Biology and Evolution}, number = {1}, pages = {174 -- 184}, publisher = {Oxford University Press}, title = {{Reconstruction of haplotype-blocks selected during experimental evolution.}}, doi = {10.1093/molbev/msw210}, volume = {34}, year = {2016}, } @article{1224, abstract = {Sexual dimorphism in resource allocation is expected to change during the life cycle of dioecious plants because of temporal differences between the sexes in reproductive investment. Given the potential for sex-specific differences in reproductive costs, resource availability may contribute to variation in reproductive allocation in females and males. Here, we used Rumex hastatulus, a dioecious, wind-pollinated annual plant, to investigate whether sexual dimorphism varies with life-history stage and nutrient availability, and determine whether allocation patterns differ depending on reproductive commitment. To examine if the costs of reproduction varied between the sexes, reproduction was either allowed or prevented through bud removal, and biomass allocation was measured at maturity. In a second experiment to assess variation in sexual dimorphism across the life cycle, and whether this varied with resource availability, plants were grown in high and low nutrients and allocation to roots, aboveground vegetative growth and reproduction were measured at three developmental stages. Males prevented from reproducing compensated with increased above- and belowground allocation to a much larger degree than females, suggesting that male reproductive costs reduce vegetative growth. The proportional allocation to roots, reproductive structures and aboveground vegetative growth varied between the sexes and among life-cycle stages, but not with nutrient treatment. Females allocated proportionally more resources to roots than males at peak flowering, but this pattern was reversed at reproductive maturity under low-nutrient conditions. Our study illustrates the importance of temporal dynamics in sex-specific resource allocation and provides support for high male reproductive costs in wind-pollinated plants.}, author = {Teitel, Zachary and Pickup, Melinda and Field, David and Barrett, Spencer}, journal = {Plant Biology}, number = {1}, pages = {98 -- 103}, publisher = {Wiley-Blackwell}, title = {{The dynamics of resource allocation and costs of reproduction in a sexually dimorphic, wind-pollinated dioecious plant}}, doi = {10.1111/plb.12336}, volume = {18}, year = {2016}, } @article{1241, abstract = {How likely is it that a population escapes extinction through adaptive evolution? The answer to this question is of great relevance in conservation biology, where we aim at species’ rescue and the maintenance of biodiversity, and in agriculture and medicine, where we seek to hamper the emergence of pesticide or drug resistance. By reshuffling the genome, recombination has two antagonistic effects on the probability of evolutionary rescue: It generates and it breaks up favorable gene combinations. Which of the two effects prevails depends on the fitness effects of mutations and on the impact of stochasticity on the allele frequencies. In this article, we analyze a mathematical model for rescue after a sudden environmental change when adaptation is contingent on mutations at two loci. The analysis reveals a complex nonlinear dependence of population survival on recombination. We moreover find that, counterintuitively, a fast eradication of the wild type can promote rescue in the presence of recombination. The model also shows that two-step rescue is not unlikely to happen and can even be more likely than single-step rescue (where adaptation relies on a single mutation), depending on the circumstances.}, author = {Uecker, Hildegard and Hermisson, Joachim}, journal = {Genetics}, number = {2}, pages = {721 -- 732}, publisher = {Genetics Society of America}, title = {{The role of recombination in evolutionary rescue}}, doi = {10.1534/genetics.115.180299}, volume = {202}, year = {2016}, } @inproceedings{1349, abstract = {Crossing fitness valleys is one of the major obstacles to function optimization. In this paper we investigate how the structure of the fitness valley, namely its depth d and length ℓ, influence the runtime of different strategies for crossing these valleys. We present a runtime comparison between the (1+1) EA and two non-elitist nature-inspired algorithms, Strong Selection Weak Mutation (SSWM) and the Metropolis algorithm. While the (1+1) EA has to jump across the valley to a point of higher fitness because it does not accept decreasing moves, the non-elitist algorithms may cross the valley by accepting worsening moves. We show that while the runtime of the (1+1) EA algorithm depends critically on the length of the valley, the runtimes of the non-elitist algorithms depend crucially only on the depth of the valley. In particular, the expected runtime of both SSWM and Metropolis is polynomial in ℓ and exponential in d while the (1+1) EA is efficient only for valleys of small length. Moreover, we show that both SSWM and Metropolis can also efficiently optimize a rugged function consisting of consecutive valleys.}, author = {Oliveto, Pietro and Paixao, Tiago and Heredia, Jorge and Sudholt, Dirk and Trubenova, Barbora}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference 2016 }, location = {Denver, CO, USA}, pages = {1163 -- 1170}, publisher = {ACM}, title = {{When non-elitism outperforms elitism for crossing fitness valleys}}, doi = {10.1145/2908812.2908909}, year = {2016}, }