Reproductive Isolation - Hybrid Gender: Haldane's Rule

Hybrid Gender: Haldane's Rule

Haldane's Rule states that when one of the two sexes is absent in interspecific hybrids between two specific species, then the gender that is not produced, is rare or is sterile is the heterozygous (or heterogametic) sex. In mammals, at least, there is growing evidence to suggest that this is due to high rates of mutation of the genes determining masculinity in the Y chromosome.

It has been suggested that Haldane's Rule simply reflects the fact that the male gender is more sensitive than the female when the sex-determining genes are included in a hybrid genome. But there are also organisms in which the heterozygous sex is the female: birds and butterflies and the law is followed in these organisms. Therefore, it is not a problem related to sexual development, nor with the sex chromosomes. Haldane proposed that the stability of hybrid individual development requires the full gene complement of each parent species, so that the hybrid of the heterozygous sex is unbalanced (i.e. missing at least one chromosome from each of the parental species). For example, the hybrid male obtained by crossing D. melanogaster females with D. simulans males, which is non-viable, lacks the X chromosome of D. simulans.