Parasites are recognized to be some of the strongest agents of natural selection, sometimes causing major changes in the phenotypes of their hosts. Understanding the genomic determinants leading to these adaptive processes is key to understand host–parasite interactions. However, dissecting the genetic architecture of host resistance in natural systems is difficult because of the multiple factors affecting these complex traits in the wild. In this issue of Molecular Ecology, Lundregan et al. (2020) use an impressive long‐term data set to analyse the genomic architecture of host resistance to gapeworm in a metapopulation of house sparrows. The authors elegantly combine different approaches (variance component analyses, genome partitioning and genome‐wide associations) to reveal that resistance to gapeworm is under polygenic control and can have both a significant additive genetic and dominance variance. This study is one of the first to simultaneously determine genomic architecture and assess additive genetic and dominance genetic variance in parasite resistance in natural populations.

中文翻译：

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天然鸟类种群中抵抗蠕虫的基因组结构。

寄生虫被认为是自然选择的最强媒介，有时会导致其宿主表型发生重大变化。了解导致这些适应性过程的基因组决定因素是了解宿主与寄生虫相互作用的关键。然而，由于多种因素影响野生环境中的这些复杂性状，因此在自然系统中解剖宿主抗性的遗传结构非常困难。在本期《分子生态学》中，Lundregan等人。（2020年）使用令人印象深刻的长期数据集来分析房雀的一个小种群中宿主对空肠蠕虫的抗性的基因组结构。作者巧妙地结合了不同的方法（方差成分分析，基因组划分和全基因组关联）揭示了对牙虫的抗性处于多基因控制之下，并且可能具有显着的加性遗传和优势变异。这项研究是同时确定基因组结构并评估自然种群中寄生虫抗性的累加遗传和优势遗传方差的首批研究之一。