Racial divergence in abdominal bristles among parental races and newly evolved cytoraces of nasuta-albomicans complex of Drosophila

Abstract

Cytoraces are the products of interracial hybridization between Drosophila nasuta nasuta and D. nasuta albomicans. These races differ from their parents in the chromosome composition, mating preference, certain fitness phenotypes and also a few morphophenotypic traits. Now, these cytoraces are passing through 330 generations. Racial divergence in the 4th and 5th abdominal bristles among the parental races and the newly evolved cytorace 1 and 2 is reported. The results revealed that the parental races have more number of bristles than newly evolved cytoraces. Thus, these cytoraces are evolved/evolving with reduced abdominal bristle number and better fitness.