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Science 8 September 2006:
Vol. 313. no. 5792, pp. 1448 - 1450
DOI: 10.1126/science.1128721
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Reports

Gene Transposition as a Cause of Hybrid Sterility in Drosophila

John P. Masly,1* Corbin D. Jones,2 Mohamed A. F. Noor,3 John Locke,4 H. Allen Orr1

We describe reproductive isolation caused by a gene transposition. In certain Drosophila melanogaster–D. simulans hybrids, hybrid male sterility is caused by the lack of a single-copy gene essential for male fertility, JYAlpha. This gene is located on the fourth chromosome of D. melanogaster but on the third chromosome of D. simulans. Genomic and molecular analyses show that JYAlpha transposed to the third chromosome during the evolutionary history of the D. simulans lineage. Because of this transposition, a fraction of hybrids completely lack JYAlpha and are sterile, representing reproductive isolation without sequence evolution.

1 Department of Biology, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627, USA.
2 Department of Biology and Carolina Center for Genome Sciences, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA.
3 Developmental, Cell, and Molecular Biology Group/Department of Biology, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708, USA.
4 Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E9, Canada.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: msly{at}mail.rochester.edu

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