Nearly unbiased estimator of contemporary Ne /N based on kinship relationships.

Abstract

This study develops a nearly unbiased estimator of the ratio of the contemporary effective mother size to the census size in a population, as a proxy of the ratio of contemporary effective size (or effective breeding size) to census size (Ne/N or Nb/N). The proposed estimator is based on both known mother–offspring (MO) and maternal‐sibling (MS) relationships observed within the same cohort, in which sampled individuals in the cohort probably share MO relationships with sampled mothers. The rationale is that the frequency of MO and MS pairs contains information regarding the contemporary effective mother size and the (mature) census size, respectively. Therefore, the estimator can be obtained only from genetic data. We also evaluate the performance of the estimator by running an individual‐based model. The results of this study provide the following: (a) parameter range for satisfying the unbiasedness, and (b) guidance for sample sizes to ensure the required accuracy and precision, especially when the order of the ratio is available. Furthermore, the results demonstrate the usefulness of a sibship assignment method for genetic monitoring, providing insights for interpreting environmental and/or anthropological factors fluctuating Ne/N (or Nb/N), especially in the context of conservation biology and wildlife management.