title: Genetic conflicts: the usual suspects and beyond.
abstract: Selfishness is pervasive and manifests at all scales of biology, from societies, to individuals, to genetic elements within a genome. The relentless struggle to seek evolutionary advantages drives perpetual cycles of adaptation and counter-adaptation, commonly referred to as Red Queen interactions. In this review, we explore insights gleaned from molecular and genetic studies of such genetic conflicts, both extrinsic (between genomes) and intrinsic (within genomes or cells). We argue that many different characteristics of selfish genetic elements can be distilled into two types of advantages: an over-replication advantage (e.g. mobile genetic elements in genomes) and a transmission distortion advantage (e.g. meiotic drivers in populations). These two general categories may help classify disparate types of selfish genetic elements.
authors.affiliation: Division of Basic Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA 98109, USA.
authors.forename: Richard N
authors.initials: RN
authors.lastname: McLaughlin
authors.affiliation: Division of Basic Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA 98109, USA hsmalik@fhcrc.org.|Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA 98109, USA.
authors.forename: Harmit S
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-6005-0016
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Malik
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D059647:Gene-Environment Interaction; D016678:Genome; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D006801:Humans; D008540:Meiosis; D008957:Models, Genetic; D012641:Selection, Genetic
chemical_list: D004251:DNA Transposable Elements
keywords: Antagonism; Host–pathogen; Meiosis; Mitochondria; Mutualism; Red Queen; Toxin–antitoxin; Wolbachia