Related papers: Statistical Genetics and Evolution of Quantitative…
We consider an infinitely large population under stabilising selection and mutation in which the allelic effects determining a polygenic trait vary between loci. We obtain analytical expressions for the stationary genetic variance as a…
Molecular phenotypes link genomic information with organismic functions, fitness, and evolution. Quantitative traits are complex phenotypes that depend on multiple genomic loci. In this paper, we study the adaptive evolution of a…
Genetic differences between individuals associated to quantitative phenotypic traits, including disease states, are usually found in non-coding genomic regions. These genetic variants are often also associated to differences in expression…
A key goal in studies of ecology and evolution is understanding the causes of phenotypic diversity in nature. Most traits of interest, such as those relating to morphology, life-history, immunity and behaviour are quantitative, and…
Although a number of studies have shown that natural and laboratory populations initially well-adapted to their environment can evolve rapidly when conditions suddenly change, the dynamics of rapid adaptation are not well understood. Here a…
An expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) is a chromosomal region where genetic variants are associated with the expression levels of certain genes that can be both nearby or distant. The identifications of eQTLs for different tissues,…
A steady influx of a single deleterious multilocus genotype will impose genetic load on the resident population and leave multiple descendants carrying various numbers of the foreign alleles. Provided that the foreign types are rare at…
Testing the existence of a quantitative trait locus (QTL) effect is an important task in QTL mapping studies. Most studies concentrate on the case where the phenotype distributions of different QTL groups follow normal distributions with…
To understand the effect of assortative mating on the genetic evolution of a population, we consider a finite population in which each individual has a type, determined by a sequence of n diallelic loci. We assume that the population…
I consider a class of fitness landscapes, in which the fitness is a function of a finite number of phenotypic "traits", which are themselves linear functions of the genotype. I show that the stationary trait distribution in such a landscape…
Studies of the genetic loci that contribute to variation in gene expression frequently identify loci with broad effect on gene expression: expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) hotspots. We describe a set of exploratory graphical…
Using an artificial system of self-replicating strings, we show a correlation between the age of a genotype and its abundance that reflects a punctuated rather than gradual picture of evolution, as suggested long ago by Willis. In support…
GWAS in humans are revealing the genetic architecture of biomedical and anthropomorphic traits, i.e., the frequencies and effect sizes of variants that contribute to heritable variation in a trait. To interpret these findings, we need to…
Evolution has fascinated quantitative and physical scientists for decades: how can the random process of mutation, recombination, and duplication of genetic information generate the diversity of life? What determines the rate of evolution?…
The quasi-species equation describes the evolution of the probability that a random individual in a population carries a given genome. Here we map the quasi-species equation for individuals of a self-reproducing population to an ensemble of…
This paper explores the genotype-phenotype relationship. It outlines conditions under which the dependence of a quantitative trait on the genome might be predictable, based on measurement of a limited subset of genotypes. It uses the theory…
Genetic variants in cis-regulatory elements or trans-acting regulators commonly influence the quantity and spatiotemporal distribution of gene transcription. Recent interest in expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) mapping has…
Since the foundations of Population Genetics the notion of genetic equilibrium (in close analogy to Classical Mechanics) has been associated to the Hardy-Weinberg (HW) Principle and the identification of equilibrium is currently assumed by…
Genetic association data from national biobanks and large-scale association studies have provided new prospects for understanding the genetic evolution of complex traits and diseases in humans. In turn, genomes from ancient human…
This is an introductory review of deterministic mutation-selection models for asexual populations (i.e., quasispecies theory) and related topics. First, the basic concepts of fitness, mutations, and sequence space are introduced. Different…