High-throughput sequencing reveals inbreeding depression in a natural population

Significance Many studies of wild populations reveal links between heterozygosity and fitness, with relatively heterozygous individuals carrying fewer parasites, living longer and being more attractive to mates. These patterns appear ubiquitous and are often highly significant, but heterozygosity usually accounts for very little of the total variation in fitness. However, most studies analyze only around 10 loci, representing a tiny fraction of the genome. We therefore used high-throughput DNA sequencing to estimate genome-wide heterozygosity based on over 10,000 loci and found it to accurately reflect inbreeding. Applied to wild harbor seals, genome-wide heterozygosity explained almost half of the variation in parasite infection. By implication, a greater proportion of fitness variation could be linked to genotype than previously thought.