1. No sex differences in adult telomere length across vertebrates: a meta-analysis
- Author
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Victor Ronget, Jean-Michel Gaillard, Hannah Froy, Daniel H. Nussey, Jean-François Lemaître, Benjamin Rey, Florentin Remot, Biodémographie évolutive, Département écologie évolutive [LBBE], Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive - UMR 5558 (LBBE), Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (UCBL), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-VetAgro Sup - Institut national d'enseignement supérieur et de recherche en alimentation, santé animale, sciences agronomiques et de l'environnement (VAS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (UCBL), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-VetAgro Sup - Institut national d'enseignement supérieur et de recherche en alimentation, santé animale, sciences agronomiques et de l'environnement (VAS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive - UMR 5558 (LBBE), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-VetAgro Sup - Institut national d'enseignement supérieur et de recherche en alimentation, santé animale, sciences agronomiques et de l'environnement (VAS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Institute of Evolutionary Biology [Edinburgh], School of Biological Sciences [Edinburgh], University of Edinburgh-University of Edinburgh, and Ecologie et évolution des populations
- Subjects
0106 biological sciences ,[SDV]Life Sciences [q-bio] ,media_common.quotation_subject ,sexual size dimorphism ,Biology ,010603 evolutionary biology ,01 natural sciences ,Life history theory ,03 medical and health sciences ,longevity ,Organismal and evolutionary biology evolution/ecology telomere dynamics ,telomere dynamics ,lcsh:Science ,ComputingMilieux_MISCELLANEOUS ,030304 developmental biology ,media_common ,0303 health sciences ,Multidisciplinary ,Longevity ,Telomere ,Sexual dimorphism ,heterogametic sex ,ageing ,Evolutionary biology ,Meta-analysis ,Sexual selection ,Organismal and Evolutionary Biology ,life-history strategies ,lcsh:Q ,Mammal ,Heterogametic sex ,Research Article - Abstract
International audience; In many mammalian species, females live on average longer than males. In humans, women have consistently longer telomeres than men, and this has led to speculation that sex differences in telomere length (TL) could play a role in sex differences in longevity. To address the generality and drivers of patterns of sex differences in TL across vertebrates, we performed meta-analyses across 51 species. We tested two main evolutionary hypotheses proposed to explain sex differences in TL, namely the heterogametic sex disadvantage and the sexual selection hypotheses. We found no support for consistent sex differences in TL between males and females among mammal, bird, fish and reptile species. This absence of sex differences in TL across different classes of vertebrates does not support the heterogametic sex disadvantage hypothesis. Likewise, the absence of any negative effect of sexual size dimorphism on male TL suggests that sexual selection is not likely to mediate the magnitude of sex differences in TL across vertebrates. Finally, the comparative analyses we conducted did not detect any association between sex differences in TL and sex differences in longevity, which does not support the idea that sex differences in TL could explain the observed sex differences in longevity.
- Published
- 2020
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