A supergene determines highly divergent male reproductive morphs in the ruff

Three strikingly different alternative male mating morphs (aggressive 'independents', semicooperative 'satellites' and female-mimic 'faeders') coexist as a balanced polymorphism in the ruff, Philomachus pugnax, a lek-breeding wading bird(1-3). Major differences in body...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature Genetics
Main Authors: Küpper, Clemens, Stocks, Michael, Risse, Judith E, Dos Remedios, Natalie, Farrell, Lindsay L, McRae, Susan B, Morgan, Tawna C, Karlionova, Natalia, Pinchuk, Pavel, Verkuil, Yvonne I, Kitaysky, Alexander S, Wingfield, John C, Piersma, Theunis, Zeng, Kai, Slate, Jon, Blaxter, Mark, Lank, David B, Burke, Terry
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2016
Subjects:
PHILOMACHUS-PUGNAX
LINKAGE MAP
MATING STRATEGIES
SOCIAL-BEHAVIOR
SEQUENCING DATA
GENOME
FEMALE
EVOLUTION
LEKKING
DISCOVERY
Philomachus pugnax
Ruff
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/11370/5d910251-7fb8-4f63-84ab-c5daea891907
https://research.rug.nl/en/publications/5d910251-7fb8-4f63-84ab-c5daea891907
https://doi.org/10.1038/ng.3443
https://pure.rug.nl/ws/files/28410666/NatureGenetics2016_supergene_determines_ruff_morphs_Kupper_et_al.pdf
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Summary:Three strikingly different alternative male mating morphs (aggressive 'independents', semicooperative 'satellites' and female-mimic 'faeders') coexist as a balanced polymorphism in the ruff, Philomachus pugnax, a lek-breeding wading bird(1-3). Major differences in body size, ornamentation, and aggressive and mating behaviors are inherited as an autosomal polymorphism(4,5). We show that development into satellites and faeders is determined by a supergene(6-8) consisting of divergent alternative, dominant and non-recombining haplotypes of an inversion on chromosome 11, which contains 125 predicted genes. Independents are homozygous for the ancestral sequence. One breakpoint of the inversion disrupts the essential CENP-N gene (encoding centromere protein N), and pedigree analysis confirms the lethality of homozygosity for the inversion. We describe new differences in behavior, testis size and steroid metabolism among morphs and identify polymorphic genes within the inversion that are likely to contribute to the differences among morphs in reproductive traits.

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