Did doubly uniparental inheritance (DUI) of mtDNA originate as a cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) system?

Animal and plant species exhibit an astonishing diversity of sexual systems, including environmental and genetic determinants of sex, with the latter including genetic material in the mitochondrial genome. In several hermaphroditic plants for example, sex is determined by an interaction between mitochondrial cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) genes and nuclear restorer genes. Specifically, CMS involves aberrant mitochondrial genes that prevent pollen development and specific nuclear genes that restore it, leading to a mixture of female (male-sterile) and hermaphroditic individuals in the population (gynodioecy). Such a mitochondrial-nuclear sex determination system is thought to be rare outside plants. Here, we present one possible case of CMS in animals. We hypothesize that the only exception to the strict maternal mtDNA inheritance in animals, the doubly uniparental inheritance (DUI) system in bivalves, might have originated as a mitochondrial-nuclear sex-determination system. We document and explore similarities that exist between DUI and CMS, and we propose various ways to test our hypothesis. © 2022 The Authors. BioEssays published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Citation

Sophie Breton, Donald T Stewart, Julie Brémaud, Justin C Havird, Chase H Smith, Walter R Hoeh. Did doubly uniparental inheritance (DUI) of mtDNA originate as a cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) system? BioEssays : news and reviews in molecular, cellular and developmental biology. 2022 Apr;44(4):e2100283

Mesh Tags

Substances

PMID: 35170770

search → result