Relationship between inbreeding depression and selfing: The case of intrafamily selection

Abstract

The outcome of intrafamily selection on variation in the load from deleterious mutations and on the magnitude of inbreeding depression has been investigated through an analytical one-locus model of mutation-selection balance, in partially selfing and in partially parthenogenetic populations. It is shown that, in contrast with an ordinary selection model, when intrafamily selection is assumed, increasing selfing rates are associated with increasing frequencies of a recessive deleterious allele, as well as with increasing magnitudes of inbreeding depression. With the same selective regime, a similar behaviour could be observed for the frequency of a deleterious allele in the case of parthenogenesis. On the basis of these results, intrafamily selection could have important consequences on the evolution of reproductive systems. © 1996 The Genetical Society of Great Britain.