{"doi":"10.1093/gbe/evaf099","title":"Alternative Mutational Architectures Producing Identical M-Matrices can Lead to Different Patterns of Evolutionary Divergence","abstract":"Explaining macroevolutionary divergence in light of population genetics requires understanding the extent to which the patterns of mutational input contribute to long-term trends. In the context of quantitative traits, mutational input is typically described by the mutational variance-covariance matrix, the M-matrix, which summarizes phenotypic variances and covariances introduced by new mutations per generation. However, as a summary statistic, the M-matrix does not fully capture all the relevant information from the underlying mutational architecture, and there exist a myriad of possible underlying mutational architectures that give rise to the same M-matrix. Using individual-based simulations, we demonstrate mutational architectures that produce the same M-matrix can lead to different levels of constraint on evolution and result in difference in within-population genetic variance, between-population divergence, and rate of adaptation. In particular, the rate of adaptation and that of neutral evolution are both reduced when a greater proportion of loci are pleiotropic. Our results reveal that aspects of mutational input not reflected by the M-matrix can have a profound impact on long-term evolution and suggest it is important to take them into account in order to connect patterns of long-term phenotypic evolution to underlying microevolutionary mechanisms.","journal":"Genome Biology and Evolution","year":2025,"id":566612,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9477,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2025-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":864140,"name":"Matt Pennell","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":500651,"name":"Daohan Jiang","orcid":"0000-0002-3524-9725","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":97,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:56:40.491968Z","pmid":"40410123","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}