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Research Paper|Volume 8, Issue 5|pp 986—994

Inverse correlation between longevity and developmental rate among wild C. elegans strains

Yujin Lee1, Wooseon Hwang1, Juyoung Jung1, Sangsoon Park1, Josephine Jill T. Cabatbat4, Pan-Jun Kim4,5, Seung-Jae V Lee1,2,3
  • 1Department of Life Sciences, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang, Gyeongbuk, South Korea
  • 2School of Interdisciplinary Bioscience and Bioengineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang, Gyeongbuk, South Korea
  • 3Information Technology Convergence Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang, Gyeongbuk, South Korea
  • 4Asia Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics, Pohang, Gyeongbuk, South Korea
  • 5Department of Physics, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang, Gyeongbuk, South Korea

* * Equal contribution

Received: November 4, 2015Accepted: April 27, 2016Published: May 10, 2016
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.100960

Copyright: © 2016 Lee et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

Genetic studies using model organisms have shown that many long-lived mutants display impaired fitness, such as reduced fecundity and delayed development. However, in several wild animals, the association between longevity and fitness does not seem to be inevitable. Thus, the relationship between longevity and fitness in wild organisms remains inconclusive. Here, we determined the correlation between lifespan and fitness, developmental rate and brood size, by using 16 wild-derived C. elegans strains originated from various geographic areas. We found a negative correlation between lifespan and developmental rate. In contrast, we did not find such negative correlation between longevity and developmental rate among the individuals of C. elegans strains. These data imply that polymorphic genetic variants among wild isolates determine resource allocation to longevity and developmental rate.