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Intracellular battlegrounds: conflict and cooperation between transposable elements

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2003

TERESA E. LEONARDO  and
SERGEY V. NUZHDIN
TERESA E. LEONARDO
Affiliation:
Center for Population Biology, University of California at Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA
SERGEY V. NUZHDIN
Affiliation:
Section of Evolution and Ecology, University of California at Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA
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Abstract

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Transposable elements (TEs) are genomic parasites that amplify their own representation on hosts' chromosomes by inserting into new positions. It is traditionally thought that their copy number is regulated by purifying selection that eliminates hosts with higher than average TE abundance. Here, we stress that selection due to beneficial or harmful interactions between TEs introduces a whole new dimension, with implications for TE evolutionary trajectories and TE loads on hosts. This framework poses new questions requiring conceptual and experimental advances. Considering primarily Drosophila data, we make a case for within host selection on TEs by thinking expansively about the lifecycle of several TE families.

Type
Perspective
Information
Genetics Research , Volume 80 , Issue 3 , December 2002 , pp. 155 - 161
Copyright
© 2002 Cambridge University Press