Evolutionary Implications of Mechanistic Models of TE-Mediated Hybrid Incompatibility

Figure 1

A general model of the siRNA pathway demonstrating the three processes observed in both plants and animals. (1) Transposon transcripts are detected by complementary small RNAs derived from previously transcribed transposons. (2) These transcripts are post-transcriptionally cleaved by small RNA-protein complexes creating small RNAs that are amplified through an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase. (3) These newly derived small RNAs are used to target transposon transcripts as in step (1) or target the transposon sequences in the genome to induce DNA methylation and repressive chromatin modifications.