The Effects of Natural Selection, Drift, and Genetic Background on Phenotypic Variation and Correlation in E. coli

Phenotypic evolution is an essential topic within the general field of evolution. Theoretically, the outcome of phenotypic evolution may be influenced by factors such as genetic background and the interaction of natural selection and genetic drift. To gain empirical evidence for testing the effects of those factors, we used eight long-term evolved Escherichia coli populations as a model system. These populations differ in terms of genetic background (different mutation rates) as well as bottleneck size (small- and large-magnitude). Specifically, we used a plate reader to measure three growth-related traits: maximum growth rate (umax), carrying capacity (Kc), and lag time (Lt) for 40 clones within each population. For each trait we quantified the change in mean per generation, the change in variance per generation, and the correlation coefficient between pairs of traits. Interestingly, we found that the small and large bottleneck populations of one background displayed clear, distinguishing trends that were not present within the populations of the other background. This leads to the conclusion that the influence of selection and drift on a population’s phenotypic outcomes is itself influenced by the genetic background of that population. Additionally, we found a strong positive correlation between umax and Kc within each of the high-mutation populations that was not consistent with our neutral expectation. However, the other two pairs did not exhibit a similar pattern. Our results provide a novel understanding in the relationship between the evolution of E. coli growth-related phenotypes and the population-genetic environment.