Browsing by Author "Tarone, Aaron M."

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    Genomic Tools To Reduce Error in PMI Estimates Derived From Entomological Evidence
    (2016-07) Tarone, Aaron M.; Picard, Christine; Sze, Sing-Hoi
    The rationale for this research is the need to address recent research findings of genetic variation in blow fly development (Gallagher et al., 2010; Tarone et al, 2011; Owings et al., 2014). Currently, little is known about the consequences for PMI estimates of this genetic variation in blow fly traits. In addition, estimates of blow fly age can vary considerably in their accuracy. The current research examined the genetics of development-time variation in blow flies and functional genetics of the development of wild type strain. The project has begun to expand knowledge on the role of genetics in blow fly development, showing that there is ample wild genetic variation that could potentially impact forensic PMI estimates. The project's habitability estimates provide an empirical estimate of the impact of genetic variation on development-time variation. The report notes that the analyses are preliminary and advises that subsequent publications with the data presented in this report may differ from future publications based on the collection of additional data, changes in parameter settings, differences in statistical tests performed, or choices in algorithms applied to the data. Scholarly products of this research are listed.
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    The genomes of a monogenic fly: views of primitive sex chromosomes
    (Springer Nature, 2020) Andere, Anne A.; Pimsler, Meaghan L.; Tarone, Aaron M.; Picard, Christine J.
    The production of male and female offspring is often determined by the presence of specific sex chromosomes which control sex-specific expression, and sex chromosomes evolve through reduced recombination and specialized gene content. Here we present the genomes of Chrysomya rufifacies, a monogenic blow fly (females produce female or male offspring, exclusively) by separately sequencing and assembling each type of female and the male. The genomes (> 25X coverage) do not appear to have any sex-linked Muller F elements (typical for many Diptera) and exhibit little differentiation between groups supporting the morphological assessments of C. rufifacies homomorphic chromosomes. Males in this species are associated with a unimodal coverage distribution while females exhibit bimodal coverage distributions, suggesting a potential difference in genomic architecture. The presence of the individual-sex draft genomes herein provides new clues regarding the origination and evolution of the diverse sex-determining mechanisms observed within Diptera. Additional genomic analysis of sex chromosomes and sex-determining genes of other blow flies will allow a refined evolutionary understanding of how flies with a typical X/Y heterogametic amphogeny (male and female offspring in similar ratios) sex determination systems evolved into one with a dominant factor that results in single sex progeny in a chromosomally monomorphic system.