R2d2 is a mouse gene that is sometimes a
selfish gene.
R2d2 is short for "Responder to meiotic drive 2", It was discovered by
UNC School of Medicine
The University of North Carolina School of Medicine is a professional school within the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It offers a Doctor of Medicine degree along with combined Doctor of Medicine / Doctor of Philosophy or Doctor of M ...
researchers to display
transmission bias.
R2d2 is a stretch of DNA on mouse chromosome 2 that contains multiple copies of the
Cwc22 gene. When seven or more copies of that latter gene are present, ''R2d2'' becomes selfish.
In one lab breeding population, in a
selective sweep
In genetics, a selective sweep is the process through which a new beneficial mutation that increases its frequency and becomes fixed (i.e., reaches a frequency of 1) in the population leads to the reduction or elimination of genetic variation amon ...
, ''R2d2'' increased from being in 50 percent of the lab mice's chromosomes to 85 percent in 10 generations. By 15 generations, it reached
fixation.
In female mice, ''R2d2'' somehow displaces the chromosome that doesn’t contain it and it is preferentially incorporated into eggs. It has spread in the wild to several parts of the world.
See also
*
gene drive
A gene drive is a natural process and technology of genetic engineering that propagates a particular suite of genes throughout a population by altering the probability that a specific allele will be transmitted to offspring (instead of the Mende ...
*
Homing endonuclease gene
The homing endonucleases are a collection of endonucleases encoded either as freestanding genes within introns, as fusions with host proteins, or as self-splicing inteins. They catalyze the hydrolysis of genomic DNA within the cells that synth ...
References
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Genes
Mice