Accumulation and heritability of mutations in reef-building corals
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Mutations are the fundamental source of variation among organisms, and they can have deleterious, neutral, or beneficial effects on the overall fitness of an organism. Whether a mutation affects the organism it arises in, the offspring of that organism, or both depends on what type of cell it arises in. In many animals, mutations in germ cells are inherited by the offspring, whereas somatic cells are generally thought not to be inherited. Somatic mutations can cause cancer, aging, and general genome instability. However, plants and many basal animal taxa may lack embryonic germ-soma distinction. Colonial reef-building corals can grow to be meters across, live for hundreds to thousands of years while maintaining fertility, and almost never develop recognizable tumors. Whether they have embryonic germline segregation is controversial. All of this makes them a pivotal group in which to understand genome maintenance. Corals also create critical ecosystems that are threatened by many stressors, including ocean warming. Mutation research in corals thus has far-reaching implications for the study of genome integrity and cell lineage development, as well as for the capacity of these animals to adapt when faced with selective pressures. In this dissertation I characterize the rates and patterns of somatic, germ, and stem cell mutations in corals. I show that 26% of the post-embryonic mutations found in the parent soma are inherited by their sperm. I also compare the rates of different types of mutations in corals living under normal conditions to those living in former nuclear test sites. The results yield insight into genome maintenance dynamics and somatic mutation inheritance in a colonial organism with a position in the tree of life that suits it to be key in understanding the evolution of germline-soma distinction. It also points to how population diversity arises in these animals, key information when considering how they may adapt in the coming years.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic resource; remote; computer; online resource |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Place | California |
| Place | [Stanford, California] |
| Publisher | [Stanford University] |
| Copyright date | 2021; ©2021 |
| Publication date | 2021; 2021 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | López-Nandam, Elora Hayter |
|---|---|
| Degree supervisor | Palumbi, Stephen R |
| Thesis advisor | Palumbi, Stephen R |
| Thesis advisor | Hadly, Elizabeth Anne, 1958- |
| Thesis advisor | Petrov, Dmitri Alex, 1969- |
| Thesis advisor | Rosenberg, Noah |
| Degree committee member | Hadly, Elizabeth Anne, 1958- |
| Degree committee member | Petrov, Dmitri Alex, 1969- |
| Degree committee member | Rosenberg, Noah |
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Biology |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Elora Hayter López-Nandam. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Biology. |
| Thesis | Thesis Ph.D. Stanford University 2021. |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/kj020rh6303 |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2021 by Elora Hayter López-Nandam
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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