Transposable elements are mobile DNA sequences that integrate into host genomes using diverse mechanisms with varying degrees of target site specificity. While the target site preferences of some engineered transposable elements are well studied, the natural target preferences of most transposable elements are poorly characterized. Using population genomic resequencing data from 166 strains of ...

A quantitative model is proposed for the expected degree of relationship between copies of a family of transposable elements in a finite population of hosts. Special cases of the model (in which the process of homogenization of element copies either is or is not limited by transposition rate) are presented and illustrated, using data on mobile sequences from different species. It is shown that ...