The Kinship Theory of Genomic Imprinting (KTGI) posits that, in species where females mate with multiple males, there is selection for a male to enhance the reproductive success of his offspring at the expense of other males and his mating partner. Reciprocal crosses between honey bee subspecies show parent-of-origin effects for reproductive traits, suggesting that males modify the expression of genes related to female function in their female offspring. This effect is likely to be greater in the Cape honey bee (Apis mellifera capensis), because a male's daughters have the unique ability to produce female offspring that can develop into reproductive workers or the next queen without mating. We generated reciprocal crosses between Capensis and another subspecies and used RNA-seq to identify transcripts that are over- or underexpressed in the embryos, depending on the parental origin of the gene. As predicted, 21 genes showed expression bias towards the Capensis father's allele in colonies with a Capensis father, with no such bias in the reciprocal cross. A further six genes showed a consistent bias towards expression of the father's allele across all eight colonies examined, regardless of the direction of the cross. Consistent with predictions of the KTGI, six of the 21 genes are associated with female reproduction. No gene consistently showed overexpression of the maternal allele.

中文翻译：

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父本偏向的基因表达遵循雌性蜜蜂胚胎中亲属选择的预测。

基因组印记的亲属关系理论（KTGI）认为，在雌性与多个雄性交配的物种中，可以选择雄性来增强其后代的繁殖成功，而会牺牲其他雄性及其交配伙伴。蜜蜂亚种之间的相互杂交显示了其生殖性状的原产地效应，表明雄性会修饰其雌性后代中与雌性功能相关的基因的表达。这种效果在开普敦蜜蜂（Apis mellifera capensis）中可能会更大，因为雄性的女儿具有产生雌性后代的独特能力，这些雌性后代可以发展成繁殖工人或下一个女王而不交配。我们在Capensis和其他亚种之间产生了相互的杂交，并使用RNA-seq来鉴定在胚胎中过表达或表达不足的转录本，具体取决于该基因的亲本起源。如所预测的，在具有Capensis父亲的菌落中，有21个基因显示了对Capensis父亲的等位基因的表达偏向，而在反向杂交中没有这种偏向。不管杂交的方向如何，另外六个基因显示了在所有八个菌落中父亲等位基因表达的一致偏向。与KTGI的预测一致，这21个基因中有6个与女性生殖有关。没有基因始终显示母亲等位基因的过表达。的一个等位基因与一个卡普顿（Capensis）父亲同在一个殖民地，在互逆中没有这种偏倚。不管杂交的方向如何，另外六个基因显示了在所有八个菌落中父亲等位基因表达的一致偏向。与KTGI的预测一致，这21个基因中有6个与女性生殖有关。没有基因始终显示母亲等位基因的过表达。的一个等位基因与一个卡普顿（Capensis）父亲同在一个殖民地，在互逆中没有这种偏倚。不管杂交的方向如何，另外六个基因显示了在所有八个菌落中父亲等位基因表达的一致偏向。与KTGI的预测一致，这21个基因中有6个与女性生殖有关。没有基因始终显示母亲等位基因的过表达。