The effects of deleterious mutations on evolution in non-recombining genomes.

Analyzing regions of the Drosophila genome that have low levels of genetic recombination helps us understand the prevalence of sexual reproduction. Here, we show that genetic variability in these regions can be explained by interference among strongly deleterious mutations and that selection becomes progressively less effective in influencing the behaviour of neighbouring sites as the number of closely linked sites on a chromosome increases.