Analysis of Epistasis in Natural Traits Using Model Organisms

A nice new essay in Trends in Genetics

Campbell RF, McGrath PT, Paaby AB. Analysis of Epistasis in Natural Traits Using Model Organisms. Trends Genet. 2018 [PubMed]

Highlights

Identification of statistical epistasis in natural populations remains challenging due to the relationship between allele frequency and statistical power.

Artificial populations have been constructed in model organisms to detect statistical epistasis between two regions of the genome; however, it is difficult to use these results to understand how epistasis operates in natural populations.

Studies of focal perturbations in defined genetic backgrounds suggests that natural selection can influence the types of nonadditive relationships that exist.