Summary
Slow vs. fast alleles at an esterase locus show a sex-linked pattern of inheritance in colonies of the termite Incisitermes schwarzi. As might be expected where a gene has only recently been brought into sex-linkage by means of a translocation between an autosome and a sex-chromosome, males as well as females can be heterozygous; males are therefore “holozygous”, not hemizygous, for this gene. The rate of exchange of this gene between X and Y chromosomes is 2/266 or less. In the founding reproductives (male or female), X chromosomes may have either the fast or the slow allele; in males, only Y chromosomes carrying the fast allele have been found. This linkage disequilibrium may be due to a founder effect, to “hitch-hiking” of the gene with the translocation, or to a sex difference in the fitness of gene combinations at or near this locus.
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References
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Luykx, P. A sex-linked esterase locus and translocation heterozygosity in a termite. Heredity 46, 315–320 (1981). https://doi.org/10.1038/hdy.1981.43
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/hdy.1981.43
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