Evolutionary Patterns of Sex-Biased Genes in Three Species of Haplodiploid Insects

Abstract

Females and males often differ obviously in morphology and behavior, and the differences between sexes are the result of natural selection and/or sexual selection. To a great extent, the differences between the two sexes are the result of differential gene expression. In haplodiploid insects, this phenomenon is obvious, since males develop from unfertilized zygotes and females develop from fertilized zygotes. Whiteflies of the Bemisia tabaci species complex are typical haplodiploid insects, and some species of this complex are important pests of many crops worldwide. Here, we report the transcriptome profiles of males and females in three species of this whitefly complex. Between-species comparisons revealed that non-sex-biased genes display higher variation than male-biased or female-biased genes. Sex-biased genes evolve at a slow rate in protein coding sequences and gene expression and have a pattern of evolution that differs from those of social haplodiploid insects and diploid animals. Genes with high evolutionary rates are more related to non-sex-biased traits—such as nutrition, immune system, and detoxification—than to sex-biased traits, indicating that the evolution of protein coding sequences and gene expression has been mainly driven by non-sex-biased traits.