Abstract
BackgroundIndividuals rarely grow as fast as their physiologies permit despite the fitness advantages of being large. One reason may be that rapid growth is costly, resulting for example in somatic damage. The chromosomal ends, the telomeres, are particularly vulnerable to such damage, and telomere attrition thus influences the rate of ageing. Here, we used a transgenic salmon model with an artificially increased growth rate to test the hypothesis that rapid growth is traded off against the ability to maintain somatic health, assessed as telomere attrition.ResultsWe found substantial telomere attrition in transgenic fish, while maternal half-sibs growing at a lower, wild-type rate seemed better able to maintain the length of their telomeres during the same time period.ConclusionsOur results are consistent with a trade-off between rapid growth and somatic (telomere) maintenance in growth-manipulated fish. Since telomere erosion reflects cellular ageing, our findings also support theories of ageing postulating that unrepaired somatic damage is associated with senescence.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12862-015-0436-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Individuals rarely grow as fast as their physiologies permit despite the fitness advantages of being large
growth hormone (GH)-transgenic salmon strain and fish husbandry We studied growth–manipulated coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch), a semelparous species in which individuals die at maturation [38]
After 10 months growth, GH transgenesis had resulted in on average 54-fold heavier and 7-fold longer fish compared to wild-type maternal half-sibs
Summary
Individuals rarely grow as fast as their physiologies permit despite the fitness advantages of being large. One reason may be that rapid growth is costly, resulting for example in somatic damage. We used a transgenic salmon model with an artificially increased growth rate to test the hypothesis that rapid growth is traded off against the ability to maintain somatic health, assessed as telomere attrition. One would expect individuals to grow as fast as they can. Such maximum growth rates are rarely observed, suggesting that rapid growth is costly [1, 2]. Several studies have documented a link between growth rate and lifespan The mechanistic links behind this trade-off are far from understood
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