Temporal genomics in Hawaiian crickets reveals compensatory intragenomic coadaptation during adaptive evolution

Nat Commun. 2024 Jun 12;15(1):5001. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-49344-4.

Abstract

Theory predicts that compensatory genetic changes reduce negative indirect effects of selected variants during adaptive evolution, but evidence is scarce. Here, we test this in a wild population of Hawaiian crickets using temporal genomics and a high-quality chromosome-level cricket genome. In this population, a mutation, flatwing, silences males and rapidly spread due to an acoustically-orienting parasitoid. Our sampling spanned a social transition during which flatwing fixed and the population went silent. We find long-range linkage disequilibrium around the putative flatwing locus was maintained over time, and hitchhiking genes had functions related to negative flatwing-associated effects. We develop a combinatorial enrichment approach using transcriptome data to test for compensatory, intragenomic coevolution. Temporal changes in genomic selection were distributed genome-wide and functionally associated with the population's transition to silence, particularly behavioural responses to silent environments. Our results demonstrate how 'adaptation begets adaptation'; changes to the sociogenetic environment accompanying rapid trait evolution can generate selection provoking further, compensatory adaptation.

MeSH terms

  • Adaptation, Physiological / genetics
  • Animals
  • Biological Evolution
  • Evolution, Molecular
  • Female
  • Genome, Insect
  • Genomics* / methods
  • Gryllidae* / genetics
  • Gryllidae* / physiology
  • Hawaii
  • Linkage Disequilibrium
  • Male
  • Mutation
  • Selection, Genetic
  • Transcriptome / genetics