Epistasis and Adaptation on Fitness Landscapes
Publisher DOI
Abstract
Epistasis occurs when the effect of a mutation depends on its carrier’s genetic background. Despite increasing evidence that epistasis for fitness is common, its role during evolution is contentious. Fitness landscapes, which are mappings of genotype or phenotype to fitness, capture the full extent and complexity of epistasis. Fitness landscape theory has shown how epistasis affects the course and the outcome of evolution. Moreover, by measuring the competitive fitness of sets of tens to thousands of connected genotypes, empirical fitness landscapes have shown that epistasis is frequent and depends on the fitness measure, the choice of mutations for the landscape, and the environment in which it was measured. In this article, I review fitness landscape theory and experiments and their implications for the role of epistasis in adaptation. I discuss theoretical expectations in the light of empirical fitness landscapes and highlight open challenges and future directions toward integrating theory and data and incorporating ecological factors.
Date Issued
2022-09-14
Publication Type
Article
Subject(s)
Language(s)
en
Journal
Annual review of ecology, evolution, and systematics
Publisher
Annual Reviews Inc.
ISSN
1543-592X
Access(Rights)
restricted