Offspring genetic effects on maternal care

• Published in: Frontiers in neuroendocrinology 2019-01, Vol.52, p.195-205
• Main Authors: Potter, Harry G., Ashbrook, David G., Hager, Reinmar
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Indirect genetic effects; Maternal behaviour; Offspring solicitation; Ultrasonic vocalizations
• ISSN: 0091-3022; 1095-6808
• DOI: 10.1016/j.yfrne.2018.12.004

[Display omitted] •Mammalian maternal care is controlled by both neuronal and hormonal regulation.•Parent-offspring conflict shapes the evolution of parental care.•Genes expressed in offspring indirectly affect the level and quality of maternal care.•Candidate genes for indirect genetic effects on maternal care have been identified by QTL mapping. Parental care is found widely across animal taxa and is manifest in a range of behaviours from basic provisioning in cockroaches to highly complex behaviours seen in mammals. The evolution of parental care is viewed as the outcome of an evolutionary cost/benefit trade-off between investing in current and future offspring, leading to the selection of traits in offspring that influence parental behaviour. Thus, level and quality of parental care are affected by both parental and offspring genetic differences that directly and indirectly influence parental care behaviour. While significant research effort has gone into understanding how parental genomes affect parental, and mostly maternal, behaviour, few studies have investigated how offspring genomes affect parental care. In this review, we bring together recent findings across different fields focussing on the mechanism and genetics of offspring effects on maternal care in mammals.