Genome duplication, divergent resolution and speciation.

Department of Biology, University of Konstanz, 78457 Konstanz, Germany. john.taylor@uni-konstanz.de

What are the evolutionary consequences of gene duplication? One answer is speciation, according to a model initially called Reciprocal Silencing and recently expanded and renamed Divergent Resolution. This model shows how the loss of different copies of a duplicated gene in allopatric populations (divergent resolution) can promote speciation by genetically isolating these populations should they become reunited. Genome duplication events produce thousands of duplicated genes. Therefore, lineages with a history of genome duplication might have been especially prone to speciation via divergent resolution.

PMID: 11377777 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]