Sexual selection modulates genetic conflicts and patterns of genomic imprinting

Abstract

Recent years have seen a surge of interest in linking the theories of kin selection and sexual selection. In particular, there is a growing appreciation that kin selection, arising through demographic factors such as sex-biased dispersal, may modulate sexual conflicts, including in the context of male–female arms races characterized by coevolutionary cycles. However, evolutionary conflicts of interest need not only occur between individuals, but may also occur within individuals, and sex-specific demography is known to foment such intragenomic conflict in relation to social behavior. Whether and how this logic holds in the context of sexual conflict—and, in particular, in relation to coevolutionary cycles—remains obscure. We develop a kin-selection model to investigate the interests of different genes involved in sexual and intragenomic conflict, and we show that consideration of these conflicting interests yields novel predictions concerning parent-of-origin specific patterns of gene expression and the detrimental effects of different classes of mutation and epimutation at loci underpinning sexually selected phenotypes.